Epilogue: The Queen Family

Emily:

Since their wedding day two years ago, Felicity Smoak has no longer been just my mom.

Stephen:

She has become my mom, too. And Oliver Queen has no longer been just my dad.

Emily:

He has become my dad, too! They're our Mom and Dad!

Stephen:

In February of last year, they became Mom and Dad to two more blonde-haired Queens – our baby brother Thomas John Queen, whom we fondly call TJ and whom Dad named after his two best buddies, and our baby sister Olive Rose Queen, whom we fondly call Liv and whom Mom named after the love of her life and the memory of their wedding night, which was the night she suspects the twins were conceived.

Emily:

The day they were born was the happiest day of my life! I was thrilled to finally be a big sister to two adorable tots!

Stephen:

We are now a family. A very happy one. We do everything together. Dad and Mom had agreed to set aside special days to spend time with each of us. Mondays are my days. After school, Dad and I would usually jog at the park and talk about "guy stuff," and then we'd spend the rest of the evening at Big Belly Burger hanging out with Diggle, Uncle Tommy (if he's not on a date with his fiancée, Aunt Sara Lance), and sometimes, Roy Harper (who is now my Aunt Thea's boyfriend). If it's Mom's turn, she and I would usually stay home and spend the entire afternoon after school cooped up in her computer laboratory – for which the security code for entry is known only by her. She'd teach me computer stuff, or help me with homework and projects. She's fantastic! I never get grades lower than A- for schoolwork.

Emily:

Tuesdays are mine. After school, Mom and I would usually stop by the grocery for food and supplies. Young as I am, she's already teaching me how to pick out fresh vegetables and ripe fruits, how to tell if the meats were still good or if the breads were stale. Shopping is always fun when I do it with Mom… especially because I always get to go home with something new – clothes, shoes, hair accessories, books, or toys. Haha! If it's Dad's turn, he's usually teaching me how to ride my bike. Now it is still has training wheels, but he says that as soon as I'm ready, he's gonna take them off and let me ride by myself. Sometimes, when Mom's not looking, he'd take me on a motorcycle joyride all around the huge Queen property… without a helmet. I love the feel of the wind on my face and how my curly blonde hair flies in the air. Dad says it's our little secret, and I promised not to tell. Ooops! Sorry.

Stephen:

Wednesdays belong to TJ, and Thursdays belong to Liv. The twins are just about a year and a half, but they both seem very smart. They take after me, I think. I never thought Dad was the cartoons type of guy, but when it came to the twins, he endured hours and hours of watching Disney Junior and Baby TV on cable, until he learned to enjoy it himself. Sometimes, I laugh when I hear him humming the theme songs of Jake and the Neverland Pirates or the Little Einsteins, especially when he dances around to make TJ or Liv laugh. It's hilarious! When it's Mom's turn to spend time alone with either TJ or Liv, it's all about ABCs, 123s, colors, and shapes. She says she's starting off the twins young, like her dad had done with her. She believes they'll both turn out to be geniuses like her.

Emily:

Fridays? Those days are untouchable! We couldn't make Mom or Dad bend. Not for a movie, or a night out at the mall, not even for a basketball game. That's our parents' alone time. Sometimes they'd go out on a date, have dinner in a nice, expensive restaurant or just in a regular fast-food joint, or they'd go watch a movie or a concert. They're not real picky, as long as they're together. Sometimes they just stroll in our favorite park or sit quietly on her park bench and talk for hours. At other times they just stay home and work out together in the gym, and for some silly reason, they end up getting locked in there all night that they'd skip dinner altogether. It's happened several times… I've lost count! I still can't figure out how that happens. Don't grown-ups have keys or something?!

Oliver:

Park day for our growing family was moved to Saturday when the twins arrived. Stephen and I still play basketball together while Emily and Felicity stay with TJ and Liv in the sandbox or the playground.

I love my life. What more could a man ask for? I have a brilliant, gorgeous wife. I have beautiful, smart kids. I run an ever-expanding company, which I dream of passing on to my children someday, if they want to be involved in it. I am happy… not because I can do whatever I want with my life regardless of how it affects the people around me… but because I am giving more and more of myself to the people I love, sometimes to the point of having to make sacrifices just to give them what's best.

One such sacrifice is coming up. Felicity has been wanting to move out of the mansion ever since the twins were born. She says it's hard for her – for us – to raise our children the way we want to raise them if we are not the king and queen of our home. At first, I had tried to convince her of the many advantages of staying with my side of the family. We had Thea or Grandma Moira to help with babysitting, especially on Friday nights. We had Lucia and the servants to do chores and cook our meals. But still, Felicity has remained firm and consistent with her conviction. And now that she has stopped nagging me about the issue for quite some time, I feel it's about time I reconsider and just give her what she's been asking for. Because when I really thought hard about it, I realized she's been right all along.

Felicity:

Sundays are my favorite days. Church in the morning, and family time in the afternoon. Rev. Olson has gotten Oliver involved in the men's group. Emily finally got her break in the children's choir. The choir director tells me that at age six, she's already showing signs of becoming a really good singer. And who else could she have gotten that talent from? Your guess is as good as mine. Anyways, the director says Emily will soon be doing solos for the choir. I'm so proud of my little angel!

Sunday afternoons, we have family time. We sing songs, play all sorts of games, and do short dramas. My favorite part is storytelling. Oliver and I would take turns reading Bible stories, folk tales, fairy tales, fables, and other stories with lessons to learn from. We end our special time with prayers. We pray for our health, our safety, our loved ones and friends, Dad's and Mom's jobs, the kids' schoolwork, and many other things we could think of. These help keep our faith strong. Oliver likes the way I've passed on what my dad has taught me to our own kids.

Sometimes during the holidays or school breaks, Connor stays with us for a week. All four kids adore him. He's not the typical teenager who gets irritated and annoyed by kids crawling all over him, or riding his back, or messing up his things. He doesn't mind their mess and their noise at all. He says he's used to these things because he's had practice with his own little sister back in Central City. Oliver makes sure he bonds with Connor each time he's with us. Oliver takes him to the office and shows him around. They'd go watch professional basketball or hockey games. I'm so proud of my husband. He's been trying real hard to make up for lost time with Connor.

Oliver:

Business at Queen Consolidated has never been better. With Thea by my side, helping me run the company, I've been able to lead everyone almost as well as my late father had. Hopefully, our brother-and-sister tandem would continue to do wonders, as we try to bring QC a notch higher, not just in terms of profit, but also in terms of charity work and contributing to the betterment of the standard of living in Starling City.

Felicity has stayed on as Senior IT Consultant. Despite the shares in the company given to her by Palmer, she has shown no interest in becoming a member of the Board. And no matter how many times I've tried in the last two years to convince her that she's perfect and ready to be the head of the IT department, she has constantly declined. Her reason is no longer based on her fears of what people might think or say, for no one would dare cross the CEO's wife. Her primary reason is her priority that she is first and foremost my wife and the mother of our children. She says the time will come for her to be more involved in the company when they're older, and when they don't need her running after them all the time.

The problem is… that might not happen in the near future. You see, she's… we're… we're expecting another baby girl in two weeks. I know, I know… there's no one else to blame for this but me. In the beginning, she did blame me. When she found out she was pregnant again, she stayed in our bedroom all day and cried.

That day, Felicity came out of our bathroom holding a positive pregnancy test in her hand. "Look what you've done, Oliver Queen!" she fumed. "The twins are barely ten months old! They haven't even started to walk, and I'm gonna be running after them with a belly the size of a watermelon when they do!" She cried on and off for days and had mood swings that were worse than post-partum blues. I didn't know what to do.

When the Diggles learned about all this, Lyla called me up and suggested that perhaps Felicity was experiencing burnout. "Think about it, Oliver," Lyla said, "It's not easy what she's doing day in and day out. I have just one child, and she drives me crazy sometimes. On top of her work for QC, Felicity has to take care of an ten-year-old boy, a five-year-old girl, and infant twins. And then there's you. Put yourself in her shoes. How do you think she feels now that there's another life growing inside her – which, by the way, is your fault! It's not that she doesn't want this baby, Oliver. I'm sure she loves it. She's over-fatigued, and she probably just needs to be assured that she won't be alone in facing the complicated challenges of marriage and motherhood."

"Where do women get all these? They're so sensitive and insightful," I had thought to myself. I took Lyla's advice. I shipped the twins out to the Diggle home, elbowed Thea into taking charge of Stephen and Emily, and took my wife on a ten-day Caribbean cruise. I gave her my 100% attention and did everything I could to show her how much I appreciated what she does for me and the kids. After that cruise, Felicity was back to her old self again.

When she successfully hurdled the first trimester of morning sickness – which, for her, was more of all-day sickness – she began to glow… up until now. While other pregnant women who approach the last trimester usually double their weight and size, become irritable, and bloat, my Felicity is ever radiant and blooming. In fact, if I'm really honest with myself, I must say that I actually find her more attractive and desirable now than ever before. And if she's up to it, I'd like to try for one more Queen when this one's a year old. I know what you're thinking, but hey, it's my family.

Felicity:

I heard you! But Oliver, honey, I'm not going to argue with you on that. Kids are fun, and you're a fantastic father and husband. If we can have one more shot while I'm still at my prime, I don't see why not!

You folks need to know that it's actually pointless for me to argue and quarrel with Oliver Queen… because in the end, I always win. So why waste my breath and blow my temper, if I could just ask nicely? ...while giving him a rub-down at the end of a long day at the office, or after singing him a song when he's relaxing on the couch with his head on my lap, or when we snuggle up close in the morning light after a wonderful evening of husband-wife intimacy. I know, I know… I've learned a few tricks over the last two years since we tied the knot, but adjusting to married life hasn't exactly been easy for me.

You see, I had been used to making decisions for myself and for my daughter. I had been used to trouble-shooting and solving my own problems. When I married Oliver, things changed. A lot. In the beginning, we bickered over petty things and fought over some major issues. It was hard for me to hear him out because honestly – and I say this to my shame – I've always thought I was the smarter one. But really, each time I insisted that my point of view was the right one, each time I pushed my husband to the limits of his patience, I wasn't really showing how smart I was. I was actually the loser. I've been learning that winning an argument is not really the point. Nurturing our relationship is.

For Oliver, it was easier. He had already been married before, so he had an edge. He had learned so much from his heartaches with Laurel and his grief over her loss that he sort of had this mental list of things he was determined not to do if ever he got married again. That mental list really helped him… helped us. In our relationship, he is the more patient one, the more understanding one, the more thoughtful one. He's really, really sweet, and if I could express exactly what I mean in the form of a compliment, it would be this: that my husband keeps on loving me in spite of all my flaws and imperfections and has, in fact, never stopped courting me to this very day. I am secure in his love, because time and time again, unless it's really important, Oliver chooses me over everything and everyone else.

He chooses me over work. He is mastering the art of delegation and uncovering the many benefits of synergistic teamwork in the office, such that he does not have to go on overtime just to beat deadlines, and especially not on a Friday night!

He chooses me over other women. Everyone in QC knows that their CEO will never be seen alone with another woman in an elevator, in an employee's cubicle, or in a car. He takes me with him to business dinners and business trips, and introduces me as his wife to the people we meet. He has been very careful to avoid those things that had made self-control very hard for him when he was the young playboy that he was. One day, during our honeymoon, he had made a pact with his eyes in my presence that he will not look at anyone anywhere lustfully, and that he will only have eyes for me. Oh, there were a few times when he had almost slipped up, but since he had considered himself accountable to me, I had been able to help him and offer comfort as his wife.

He chooses me over his mother. Moira knows that if ever she and I had differences in opinion, her son would never side with her. Not that he tolerates or condones my mistakes or wrong behavior. What I mean is that, whether or not I'm right, he proves that his loyalty is with me, the woman that he is one with. He doesn't put me down in the presence of my in-laws. And when he and I have a fight, he doesn't try to get them to side with him.

He chooses me over his friends. Yes, he hangs out with Tommy, with Diggle, and sometimes with his father-in-law Captain Lance, but he could always say "no" when he knows I need him. I haven't felt jealous of any of his friends because I know for sure that I am his best friend.

He chooses me over our very own children. He knows I'd do anything for our kids, anything at all. Hey, I'd even attempt the impossible if it meant keeping them safe and giving them the best. But he always reminds me to save some time and energy for myself, especially after that burnout spell I had eight months ago. He insists that I religiously maintain my Friday mornings off, either alone doing what I want to do, or with other girl friends like Lyla and Sara, or with my sister-in-law Thea. Whenever Stephen or Emily disrespect me or talk back at me, he steps in. He tells them in his deep, firm voice, "Look, this woman here is not just your mother. She's my wife, and I don't tolerate tantrums against my wife! If you disrespect her, you answer to me."

He chooses me over his own life. I feel safe and protected because I know that my husband is willing to give his life for me if the situation calls for it. I think the trouble at the Glades is enough proof of that. Laying down one's life is the ultimate test of genuine love.

Stephen:

Life has been good to our family.

Emily:

We have everything I've ever dreamed of and more.

Felicity:

My marriage is not perfect, and my children are far from perfect, but we are very blessed indeed.

Oliver:

I'm sure there will be more troubles up ahead, but the Queens will make it… by faith… with hope… because of love.

****THE END****