"Arrow!" A voice yelled through his ear, but he could faintly hear it.

"Oliver! Get up!" A female voice this time.

He imagined Felicity through hazy eyes, shaking him with a worried look on her face.

"Oliver! Wake up!" Felicity's love and pain for him wasn't enough to get him awake.

"Over here, Ollie."

Oliver swung his legs off the hammock, stirred by another woman's gentle call for him.

"Laurel?" he called out, in search of her.

He found her on a balcony, overlooking a calming ocean as she hugged a shawl around herself. He came up behind her, seeing nothing but the water, the sand, and the sky.

"Hey there, pretty bird." Oliver whispered in her hair as he wrapped his arms around her from behind.

"Did you rest well?"

"I don't think I can ever rest when I'm on an island alone."

"You're not alone. You have me. You always have me."

"I know." He breathed in a long breath and dug his chin into her shoulder, listening to the crashing waves.

"You're tensed." Laurel ran her hands up his arms.

"Of course you can tell." He laughed.

Laurel turned around and smiled a worried smile as she caressed his face, then led him to sit on the steps.

"You're feeling small. Like nothing is in your hands."

"How do you do that?"

"Partly because I'm your subconscious. But I've always been able to read you, Ollie. You are my best friend. My first everything. I know you better than I know the back of my hand."

"Yeah? I think I'm familiar with it!" he joked. She laughed.

"Only when you deserved it."

"But you didn't. When I expected you to be the one most hurt by my actions, or the consequences of my actions, you were the bigger person."

"You're talking about Willie?"

"Willie?"

"Samantha's son."

"I know that! So, instead of being mad about his existence, you call him Willie?"

"I don't hate the kid, Ollie. And I get why you kept him secret from everyone. This life, that we are living now. It doesn't allow us to have kids. At best, we'd be leaving behind orphans, and we all know how good Star city is with those!"

"I'm glad you get that! Why doesn't Felicity get that?!"

As Oliver's mind riled up, so did everything his mind created. The waves got rougher, the sand got hotter, and Laurel got madder.

"Why does she even get to have an opinion on this?" Laurel jumped into the sand, pacing as she ranted, Ollie on her heels.

"William happened from a relation long before you even knew Felicity existed! Felicity wants control, she wants to make her man. She can't accept you the way you are. You know you have to make hard decisions as life throws curveballs at you, and she can't swallow that. She wants her dream man, not the man that you are."

Oliver watched as Laurel went on a monologue, making him face the hard truth about his relationship with Felicity.

"You were just a fascination for her. She saw you with Sarah and she saw your ability to let the real you free every night you put on that mask, and she wanted a piece of that life. She wanted a piece of her old life back, but in a good, not-end-up-in-juvie, kind of way. Felicity, don't get me wrong, she is an amazing person, and I'd be floored to call her a best friend, but this isn't a healthy relationship."

Laurel laughed at that.

"Took me a long time to figure that out myself. I accepted you as you are, let you have your independence. I didn't get worked up because I knew at the end, you would always come home to me. Put your head in my lap to comfort you, kiss my head before you went to work and kiss me just before you went to bed. It's always you and me, Ollie."

The ocean calmed, the sand cooled, and Laurel smiled a happy smile. Suddenly, Oliver strode forth and grabbed her face in a long hard kiss. He'd missed it. Kisses with Felicity brought him happiness for the moment, but this? This kiss, every kiss, with Laurel felt like home.

"I love you." Oliver spoke deeply into her eyes. "More than anything in this world."

"And I love you, Ollie. Sometimes so much that it scares me. You made yourself a better man than you ever were before, and along with yourself, you made me. You showed me a better way to put out my hurt. You made me stronger. I can finally feel like I'm on the same line as you. And you know I'm coming to get you, so you better have something to say when the real me gets here."

Oliver laughed nervously as he tried to think of something to say.

"We've been together a long time, you and me. Longer than even most marriages last these days. And that's because you and I, we understand each other, give each other exactly what we need. Companionship, privacy, independence, support, commitment and most importantly, faith. You believe in me. More than I've ever believed in myself. Even when you hated me, you'd have faith in me. When I need to make a hard decision, I know you'll support me in the way that I need it. Cause you see me, as who I really am."

"And I believe in you. That you have the strength to break through whatever it is that's holding you down."

"Even if you support me by walking out on me." She reminded him of when he'd done that at a dinner once.

"Oh yeah, no sugarcoating between us! We give it to each other straight."

"No other way, baby!"

Still wrapped in each other's arms, Oliver reached up and kissed the crown of her head.

"My pretty-bird."

"You know the Batman's right next to you, right?" Laurel said, and the ocean flicked into grey walls.

"Yes he is." He remembered as the sound of waves turned into buzzing, and he could feel something right next to his head.

"So wouldn't it be killer if you got up before he did?"

"Oh absolutely! Won't let him live it down." He looked down at Laurel one last time before she dusted away and Oliver woke up in wonderland.