"HOW LUCKY AM I TO HAVE SOMETHING THAT MAKES SAYING GOODBYE SO HARD," –Winnie The Pooh

William Clayton

Luck. For most, it's not such a complicated prospect. It's a successful or positive event that happens purely by chance without any help from someone's will or actions whatsoever. For most, luck is waking up to a sunny morning, winning the lottery, having the person you like to return your feelings, finding a hundred dollar bill on the pavement. For most, luck is simple.

For me, luck is my dad coming home every night. Luck is a night where the hooded vigilante doesn't have to roam the streets because there is no criminal activity. Luck is a day where I'm not being rushed out of school because Felicity got hurt. Luck is a good night's sleep with the nightmares at bay. Luck is a peaceful family dinner, with ice cream and smiles and peace. For me, luck is complicated. It's been complicated every since Lian Yu blew up into a thousand pieces right in front of my eyes.

Right now, luck is sitting on the couch, waiting for my video game to load with a bowl of brownies beside me. Luck is taking amusement from the way my dad turns the entire loft upside down trying to find his socks and his charger. And his wallet. And his perfume. And his overnight bag. Luck is watching my dad crumble down into a mess, not because someone's kidnapped or injured or because the city is being terrorized and he's under indictment, but because he can't find any of the things he needs for the business meeting the Mayor of Star City needs to attend.

"Will, have you seen that red comb anywhere?" Dad asks me, but doesn't wait for an answer before going back into the room, probably to dig through the mess once more in a futile attempt to recover whatever it is he is looking for.

And just when my game finishes loading (or maybe it happened minutes ago) the front door swings open and I only briefly glance at Felicity, knowing well enough that if it were anyone in her position, they would also be adorning her wide-eyed, open-mouthed, shocked look at the state of the place.

She stares at me, the question evident in her face and before she can even open her mouth and let out a series of words that will most definitely confuse me, I raise my hands up in defence and shrug.

"Oliver!" Her heels stomp against the marble floor, and my game is long forgotten as Dad walks out of his room, a relieved look on his face at the sight of his wife.

"Thank God Felicity. Do you have any idea where I put my comb and my charger?"

Felicity just stares at him for a minute, probably surprised at his disregard for the state of his house. Usually, it's Dad that has to remind Felicity to wash the dishes or to do her laundry. I'm assuming five years without any real hygiene can do that to you.

The blonde genius then sighs and rolls her eyes, marching into their room and I expect her response, "Okay Oliver, I know that I'm the last person that should be telling you this based off of my history of cleanliness, but you need to clean this mess pronto."

Dad runs his fingers through his hair for the hundredth time tonight and begins to protest, "But Felicity, I really need..."

"—You clean this mess up and I'll find your comb."

Felicity ends up packing Dad's entire suitcase, matching his ties to his suits and finding his charger, comb and perfume in a fraction of the time it took for dad to find one of those things. I end up reverting back to my previous musings as I wait for the other players to join the game and chose a character.

Luck. For my dad, luck is Felicity coming home from work tired and hungry but putting all of it to the side to help her husband pack. Luck is her ability to know exactly where everything of Oliver's items is. For Oliver, luck is having Felicity Smoak in his life. I'm sure of this. No one is luckier than dad to have Felicity in his life.

But I'm still a kid. Yes, I had to grow up rapidly over the course of a year and adapt to my new home, my new sense of normal, which, is the last thing from normal. But I'm still a kid. And I'm still learning so many new things. The workings of a relationship are most definitely one of them.

It happens the next evening. Dad has his packed duffle in one hand and his large briefcase in the other, standing in front of the door. I take my place behind Felicity, already having said goodbye to him multiple times. I try to put on a brave face even though my eyes sting slightly. I didn't realize it was possible to love someone so much in such a small amount of time, but even though it's for a couple of days and even though it's a safe business meeting that doesn't involve arrows and violence, I know I'm going to miss my dad.

It's Felicity's turn to wish him goodbye and no one in the room misses the way her eyes tear up.

"Felicity, hon, we've done this before." Dad says into her hair, the words coming out muffled but not incomprehensible.

Felicity sniffles before responding, "Ya, but never for a week. Whenever you're gone this long it always involves you being in danger and my heart threatening to die on me. I'm not good at goodbyes."

Dad pulls back and cups Felicity's face, "We're not saying goodbye. This is me saying, I'll see you soon."

She wraps her arms around his neck and they kiss for a long time, and I finally look away. Growing up, the only kind of relationship I knew was the one I had with mom and the ones I had with my friends. Not once was I privy to a romantic relationship between a couple, and so I find that it doesn't bother me as much as it does other kids my age. In fact, I sort of like that dad and Felicity are openly affectionate with each other. Kind of reassures me that no one is going anywhere.

"I love you." She whispers and he returns the words, before staring at me and smiling.

The next thing I know is that he's out the door and all that is left in the large (it seems too big now) loft is Felicity and I.

Luck. It's getting a good eight hours of sleep without waking up at three a.m because you're plagued by nightmares of your mom lifeless on an island and your father in the same state with an arrow sticking out of him. Tonight, luck isn't on my side.

Knowing that trying to go back to sleep would be futile, I cautiously pull open the large door, walking into the spacious living room, only to stop tiptoeing when I spot Felicity sitting on the counter, her face illuminated from the screen of her tablet.

She looks up when she senses me, and I explain,

"Nightmare."

She sighs in understanding, "Me too. Your dad keeps the nightmares at bay most of the time and he's not here so..." She thumps her fists awkwardly on her lap as she trails her last word before continuing, "He's supposed to call me when he lands."

We wait another hour in silence, our demeanour only brightening up when Felicity's tablet begins to ring, a picture of my dad displaying on the screen and within half an hour of talking to him, the two of us have curled up on the couch, oblivious to the fact that my dad still watches us from his camera, trying to keep his family safe from miles away.

Luck is having a dad and a husband who is willing to spend hours talking and watching over his slumbering family immediately after his six-hour plane landed in a different time zone.

Luck is every morning going by smoothly; a sunny day, good breakfast, happy family. Sometimes, luck isn't on my side.

I wake up the next morning to the oddly familiar smell of burnt toast. I run around in haste, opening all the windows to let the smoke out of the house, as Felicity coughs dejectedly in the kitchen. When the air is cleared, I join her at the stove and distastefully eye the piece of bread that looks like it has been dipped in tar. I've come to learn that Felicity is capable of many things. But one of them isn't cooking.

So we grab our coats and my school bag and head to IHop, where, according to Felicity, the best breakfast resides. We order so much food but only eat a fraction of it, opting to pack the rest up and take it home to sustain us for the next couple of days until Dad comes back. We've had dinner at the Diggles, and Felicity is too big a fan of Big Belly Burger for us to not have it at least once that week. The only problem was what we were going to eat for the remaining six days for lunch.

I learn that luck is your Dad hiring an Italian cook who drops by your place everyday at 11:30 a.m sharp to prepare whatever meal you desire, nut free, and devoid of kale. Luck is your Dad knowing his wife and son well enough to know that we won't be able to feed ourselves for a week without dying of extensive grease intake.

Sometimes, luck is coming home from a long day in the office and a longer day as Overwatch and being able to relax and watch a movie with your stepson, unwinding and getting the sense of peace you weren't able to get throughout the day. Sometimes, that kind of luck doesn't appear in the Queen household.

Felicity comes home from the Foundry looking like crap. Her shoulders are tightly bunched together and she looks like she's on the verge of a major breakdown. Her face has a permanent frown and even though she musters up a small smile when she sees me, I know that she's far from happy.

She gets a phone call, and from the way her face brightens up, I can guess who it is.

She stares at me, waving her phone in the air so that I see the caller ID, but I wave her away and lie, "I already talked to him when I came back from school. You can do it now."

I've had a pretty good day at school today. I aced my algebra test, got into the basketball team, and nobody looked at me like a freak; they haven't for the past few weeks now. Felicity needs my Dad more than I do now. I'll probably end up calling him afterwards anyway. He'll want to know about everything, but for now, I allow Felicity and my Dad some time alone and I'll just continue watching Insidious.

And when she walks out the door an hour later, looking so much happier, more at peace I know what luck is. Luck is Felicity coming home from work looking like an absolute mess, talking to her husband for an hour and then coming back with the frown lines invisible, the spark in her eyes returned, and a skip to every step. Luck is Dad's ability to make her feel loved and protected regardless of time or distance.

Luck. For most, it's a pretty simple concept that most don't really think much of. Not unless you're me, and you've had the worst luck imaginable only second to a group of vigilantes dubbed Team Arrow. For me, luck doesn't exist. If it did, my mom would be alive and my dad wouldn't have gone on that boat all those years ago.

But then again, you need luck. You need to believe in luck. You need the reassurance that somehow things are going to work just as they should; things are going to work out for you.

And it's during moments like these; moments when my dad comes home a day early from his business meeting and Felicity, regardless of the fact that she's in the Foundry and should be shouting instructions to the rest of team Arrow runs to him and hugs him like her life depends on it, the two of them looking like their world is complete.

It's during these moments that I know; Luck exists.

"MAYBE THAT'S WHAT LOVE MEANT, BOTH THINKING THEY WERE THE LUCKY ONE," –Meera Syal

William knows that Felicity Smoak-Queen is lucky to have his dad as her husband, just as Oliver Queen is lucky to have Felicity as his wife. What's more is that they know it too.