Chapter 12 (Or: "That Time Felicity and Oliver Flew a Plane Together")

                                    

                                          
If there's one thing Felicity misses at her new home,  it's all the little doodads and gauges that surround her when she's at  the controls of a plane.  She pulls her hat off her head and places it  on a doodad she doesn't need right now, beaming when she adjusts it just  right.  That little piece makes it feel more home-y and familiar, like  her fighter jet.  That was a long time ago, but she's always loved to  fly.  And a bird should feel like home, with all the time she spends in  them.
                          
Sometimes she thinks there was a mistake made in the womb because she  should  have born with wings.  (But, then again, she  read  that book and it didn't work out too well for  those   kids.)  It might not be as good as actual wings, but at least she has a  plane—and one with a really damn good radio, too.  The songs it plays  are  awesome—she knows all the words and everything.
                          
She's singing along to it several hours into the  flight when she senses him more than hears him.  A part of her has  become attuned to her boys in the last two years, and even after the  time she spends away, Felicity's Boy Senses still tingle when they  approach.  It could be any of the three, but she knows by his general  sense of quiet who is coming up beside her.  Without thinking, she  reaches out to him, her hand falling on the bony ridges of his ribs.
                          
Felicity is tactile.  She knows that.  Touching things is something she does to satisfy her own curiosity because things feel  different.  Billy doesn't really feel like anything; he's cute and happy, but she has to keep her eyes on him to know he's even there.
                          
A lot of things feel like that—Billy, her cats, even  that goldfish she had when she first moved into the loony bin.  (Sadly,  Gary didn't respond well to their new environment—she cried when she had  to clean the empty bowl out.)  But while some things are...  feeling-less,  her boys are something other.  They're muscle-y to the touch and warm  in a way that's blissfully alive and unapologetic about it.
                          
Of her boys, though, Oliver is the one who is always different because he's not just  one   thing.  Roy is all hard angles and bony hugs, while John is all  muscles—much softer and less pokey by comparison.  But Oliver... Oliver is   both, soft and hard (not like that) at the same time.  (Which, Felicity has decided, is what makes him capable of the best hugs  ever.)
                          
A lot of people don't like the way she tests things  by touching them.  They can't see things like Billy or her pretty red  macaw (his name is Shirley), so they call her crazy.  (Felicity doesn't  mind, though; they usually don't mean it in a bad way.)  Oliver doesn't.   He's careful about what he says to her— home  instead of  psych ward,  Caitlin  instead of  Dr. Snow,  talking  instead of  therapy.  He even asks about Billy and had Roy bring by a really expensive flea collar for him.
                          
Most importantly, he doesn't mind her touches.
                          
As if in response to her thought (though he can't read her mind—believing that  would   make her crazy), he places his hand over hers.  Though he guides hers  back to the controls, he drops his hand on her shoulder, still  maintaining contact with her but understanding that Felicity needs both  her hands to fly properly.  (She had kind of forgotten that herself.   Oliver does that to her sometimes—makes her forget things she knows are  important.)  He slips off the right section of her headset before  saying in that quiet, gravelly way, "Hey."  It makes her smile and, like  always, he smiles right back.  "How are you doing up here?"
                          
Felicity rolls her shoulders, working out the  stiffness settling in after so long flying.  She didn't even realize it  had been that long.  "Been sitting for a while," she answers, swinging  her arm to stretch and smacking him by accident.  Though the pilot means  to apologize, Oliver responds with a breathy laugh, letting her know  she's forgiven.  "I'm a little sore, but I'll live."