The Wish Factory

Chapter 15

Ryleigh stared at everyone around her, and she felt bile rising in her throat. She'd killed four people, and they were more worried about her. Sure, they'd been bad guys, and this was fiction, but it had felt real going through her memories. She discovered that she and Oliver had fought about killing at the start of her tenure with them. She'd been adamantly against taking a life, and Oliver had warned her that fighting evil combined with her powers, it was going to happen eventually. Now, here they stood and just like he'd foretold, her powers took not one, but four lives. Barry and Oliver were still arguing about keeping things from her, so she took the time to look around. Roy still held her hand, Joe was weighing in on the argument, Felicity was talking with Cisco and Caitlyn, Laurel stood off by herself, and Dig was gone. All these people cared about her; it was a family. She hadn't belonged to one in so long, it was starting to get to her. She knew that Barry was close to telling her that he was in love with her, and she wasn't ready for a scenario like that. She was going to finish this conversation and head home to deal with her mother. She needed to talk to Grady to see if they could avoid the romance option altogether until she was ready to pursue that or even willing to attempt it. When she tuned back in, and they were all still arguing, she sat up, groaning at the soreness, and yelled for them to shut up.

"God, that is enough out of all of you! You're all talking about me as if I'm not sitting right here in front of you!" Laurel unfolded her arms and walked towards her bed with a look of annoyance on her face as she spoke.

"Thank the stars, I was about to use the Canary device to shut everyone up." Ryleigh spared her a smirk before looking at Oliver once more.

"Ollie please...what's going on?" He stepped away from Barry and Joe, both who looked crestfallen and stood at the foot of her bed. He reached forward and placed a firm hand on the top of her foot before answering her.

"According to Caitlyn, the amount of energy you dispelled from your body is lethal. Now, obviously you aren't dead, but if your powers keep growing like you're worried about, it could kill you and people around you." She stared at him in silence for a few seconds until Cisco interrupted.

"Hey now, don't fret just yet because I'm already working on something to help." Oliver ignored him and began to gently knead her foot with his fingers while continuing with what he was saying.

"I get now why you left; you were afraid of exactly this. You could have told me what was happening to you, Rye, I would have listened. I mean, we could have done something to help you...I could have helped. I hate that you didn't feel like you could confide in me." Ryleigh sighed and tried to sit up, but Oliver was instantly by her side, trying to prevent that by put his hands gently on her shoulder. She eventually gave up trying and tried to calm herself down instead. She looked up at Oliver and took his hand. She then squeezed Roy's hand that held her as well and addressed all of Team Arrow, as Dig chose that exact moment to walk in.

"Look, you guys took me in when I didn't have anyone. I haven't felt like a part of something that special in a very long time. When I felt on the verge of losing control, I couldn't...wouldn't put you all in that kind of danger. It was selfish to bring this risk home to Barry, but he's probably the smartest person I know and the best friend I've ever had. I wanted to tell you what was happening, Ollie, but I knew you would have tried to convince me to stay." Oliver gave her a small smile and slipped his hand into her free hand causing her breath to catch.

She'd completely misjudged the feelings earlier, and things made so much more sense than they had before. Her reaction to Oliver was a strong one, and as she dug deeper into the implanted memories, she found that the relationship she shared with Oliver was not a platonic one like she'd initially thought. Before she could address the enormous elephant that just popped up in the room, Laurel gasped and ran towards the door, where Sara stood with a smirk on her face. She embraced Laurel and then looked straight at Ryleigh, her expression changing to one of concern. Oliver straightened out and went to greet her, completely missing the expression on Barry's face. He was looking at Oliver instead of at her, but Ryleigh saw the mixture of disbelief and anger. She was distracted away from Barry briefly because Oliver started shouting at Sara.