epilogue.

"Professional" becomes their buzz word as they ease back into active duty.

They are professionals—swear to God, they are—but the transition from friendship to relationship, from what amounts to a vacation back to business as usual combines to create a goofy, giddy honeymoon period they can't well fight. Oliver's still limited by his cast, but he helps Felicity, Diggle, and Roy get everything set up in the new lair, each to their own corners but Oliver and Felicity having a tendency to attract and collide.

Personal space is old news. "Come here for a sec" leads to, at best, side pressed to side, and at worst, arms and hands and lips and teeth in shadowy corners.

Roy and Diggle are amused, supportive, until the day comes that they are actually going to get back to work, when Digg shows up to the lair with a glass jar labeled in bold black letters PDA. He sets it on a shelf above Felicity's monitors and the others exchange a glance.

"What's that?" Roy says.

"PDA jar," Diggle says shortly. "If you two—" He points at Oliver and Felicity. "—are going to be swapping spit during work hours, I'm gonna charge you a dollar. When the jar is full, we—" He points from himself to Roy. "—are going to get ice cream. Sound fair?"

Leaning back in her desk chair, Felicity just laughs, saying, "Fair enough," but Oliver walks very deliberately over, bending to plant a kiss on her lips. As he straightens up, he holds Diggle's eyes, pulling out his wallet and stuffing a dollar in the jar. Diggle gives him two sarcastic thumbs up and they go back to the job at hand.

As soon as the apartment door closes behind them that night, Oliver wraps his arms around Felicity's waist and buries his face in her neck. "I'm tempted to take that jar as a challenge."

"Don't you dare."

"What? How else is Diggle going to get his ice cream?" He starts to walk her forward toward the kitchen and says, "I have impeccable self-control. That jar is going to stay empty if I decide to be good."

Leaning back against his chest, Felicity says, "So what you're saying is I'm completely resistable?"

He stops in the middle of the kitchen, tightening his arms and rubbing his stubble against her skin until she barks with laughter, squirming away and putting her hand up to protect her neck. "Never. It's amazingly difficult. But I am well-trained, you know."

She grins, turning in his arms and draping his over her shoulders. "I do know. Very useful training that you should now ignore entirely."

In agreement he dips his chin, kissing her as his hands slide down over her butt to lift her and wrap her legs around his waist.

It does, eventually, attain a sense of normalcy. A blessed normal, one where Oliver still watches her like she's heaven on Earth, where she sleeps so sound in his arms. The giddiness, the butterflies, never quite go away, but she learns to manage them. A new normal.

(Night after night, he goes out and she listens to the play-by-play in her earpiece, stomach tight in a knot until he comes home and she can wrap her arms around him again. That homecoming hug is exempt from the PDA jar, and thank goodness, or Diggle would gain fifty pounds.)

When she thinks about it, later, she won't be surprised that it happened in the middle of a fight; but at the time, it feels like the shock of peroxide poured on a fresh wound.

Later, she'll think about how when they're arguing the space between them feels electric and all the feelings are magnified, good and bad coming sharp and strong. Later.

There's a threat that lasts more than one night, a vicious criminal Oliver hasn't got a grasp on yet, and they're all on edge.

They leave the lair separately and Oliver tells Felicity to go straight home and lock her door, that he'll be there soon. He texts her to tell her he's coming up, and so when a knock comes on the door Felicity opens it without looking through the peephole, without fastening the chain. He's there with his face as dark as a thundercloud, mouth set in a line as he pushes past her into the apartment.

"What's wrong?" she asks as she turns the deadbolt and trails him into the living room.

He gestures at the door, his hand cutting through the air.

"Oliver…" she says, stepping closer, but he shakes his head.

"Felicity." The syllables come out hard, through gritted teeth. "You have to take this seriously."

She closes her eyes, her hackles rising as her molars clench down hard, then looks at him fiercely. "You think I don't take this seriously? Really?"

His lips press down again and he lifts his hand, running it over his hair and gripping the back of his neck. "You know how dangerous this is—"

"Yeah," she says sharply. "I know. So why do you think this is something you have to lecture me about?"

"You can't—"

"Stop." She shakes her head, pushing her glasses up her nose and then clenching her hand into a fist at her side. "If this is the way you're going to talk to me, you can just leave, all right? This is unacceptable."

"Felicity," he says again, but when she just glares at him—ultimate death glare, she calls it—he changes tack. Closing his eyes, he breathes in, visibly forcing himself to calm down. "Felicity," he says quietly, opening his eyes to look straight into hers. "I need you to be safe." She opens her mouth to argue and he holds up his hand, eyes pleading. "I love you," he says, pausing for the briefest instant, "and I need you to be safe. Okay?"

Her stomach seizes, a sharp bolt of pain, and she breathes all the way down into it. "Oliver…" Stepping forward again, she holds out her hands, palms up. "I know. I know, okay? I didn't forget; I'm not going to forget. You need to trust me."

He closes his eyes again, shoulders slumping, and she crosses the distance between them, running her hands over his shoulders and up through his hair to the back of his head. Digging her nails in just slightly, she tips his head down until he opens his eyes to look at her.

She sighs, her eyes scanning his. "I love you. Okay?"

He nods, looking for all the world like a puppy who's just been kicked, and dips his head the rest of the way to kiss the corner of her mouth, the cupid's bow, the other corner, before landing on her lower lip and sucking gently. His hands come up to cup her face and she feels it again, the way he holds her like she's something precious, and she has no choice but to forgive him.

Sometimes it feels like her heart can't possibly fit in her chest, but when she can, she reaches out to him and holds on. As long as she has him to keep her on the ground, to keep her from floating away, her hot air balloon heart can fly.

It's going to anyway; she's just along for the ride.