Unravel Me | Arrow [ COMPLETED ]

chapter fifteen

Walter waved a hand helplessly at Oliver's shadowy figure. "He won't budge on it. He says he wants Laurel or he'll go without. Moira's gone to ask her if she'd be willing. We were hoping you could convince him to change his mind about his... decision."

Cali blew out a soft breath, curling her fingers into a gentle fist and running her knuckles across her mouth. Trust Oliver to never make this easy for anybody. He could've had any attorney in Starling City, could've let the Queen family fortune buy him an entire army of lawyers, but instead, he chose the one woman who couldn't, wouldn't, be able to do this for him.

But if she thought about it, really dug into the prospect, she could see why he'd chosen Laurel. She was fierce, she was good, and she still loved him despite everything that had gone wrong between them. Laurel wouldn't let him go to jail if she thought he was innocent. Which she did. Because only Cali and John knew the truth.

Cali could feel her shoulders slumping under the weight of the secret. John didn't understand this part of knowing. He had nobody to tell. His loyalty was to Oliver. The problem was isolated to them and only them.

Cali saw Moira and Walter as her second parents, Thea as her sister. Laurel was one of her best friends. Tommy was her brother. Quinten Lance had taken her under his wing when she'd turned everyone else away. And now she had to lie to them, had to hide this massive thing because she knew if she gave Oliver away, everything he'd been fighting to keep a hold of would slip away from him.

He'd come home for this. Cali couldn't rip it all away from him just because she didn't want to be alone.

She nodded at Walter, nibbling at the inside of her bottom lip as she gently eased open the door to the interrogation room and stepped inside. It was dimmer than she expected, and the sudden shadows softened Oliver's edges. For a moment, she could see the Oliver he'd been before, the one he'd been imitating since he got back. He'd been making a few appearances lately, that young Oliver.

"Cali," Oliver said roughly, looking up at her from his chair. He looked tired, she noted. He looked really, really tired. "You came."

He'd thought she wouldn't? Cali managed a thin, reedy smile as she sank into one of the empty chairs opposite him. The table sat between them, as narrow and wide as a canyon. It was oddly fitting, given the distance between them in every other aspect of their lives.

"Despite everything," she said, voice sounding strangely muted to her own ears, "I'm still your friend. I thought the deal was that friends don't just abandon their people."

"I'm your person?"

"You're one of my people. I have a lot of people."

Oliver's smile softened. "You have a lot of people," he repeated in agreement. "I just kind of figured that after you found out, I wouldn't-"

"You wouldn't be one of my people?" Cali shook her head, scoffing slightly. "You will always be one of my people, Ollie. No matter what." She tacked on, almost like an afterthought, "Someone has to keep dragging your ass out of the fire."

Oliver leaned back in his seat, and for a moment they both just sat, pondering. Cali, for one, had never heard such an indirect way of declaring love, platonic or not. It was fitting, though, despite its strangeness. Oliver had always been her person, and he would continue to be one of her people until the day she died.

Except being one of her people meant that she watched out for him, whether he liked it or not. "Why Laurel, Ollie?" She asked, almost a little desperately. "It could've been anybody. Why her?"

Oliver's expressioned soured slightly, something bittersweet crowding around the blanketed misery in his eyes. He wouldn't tell her the whole truth, she could see it now, but she didn't care. Oliver could keep his truths buried in a box on the island inside him, but she deserved something that was at least accurate. If he was logical in his emotions, she would accept it.