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There's a finger lightly poking her cheek but Alex is much too tired to turn away.
“G’way Kara,” she mumbles into her pillow.
There's a long pause, enough for Alex to just barely drift back off to fantasizing of riding the sleek, purring motorcycle of her dreams, superhumanly strong arms wrapped tight around her. Then the finger is back, this time tracing over her cheekbone so softly that Alex flushes as her eyes snap open.
“What?” Alex rasps, rolling her eyes at the water Kara hands her.
Better to have Kara think she suffers from a dry throat and mouth than to explain just why her voice usually sounds that way upon the alien waking her.
Kara fidgets for a moment. “Please explain the cultures of Earth kisses.”
Alex blinks. “Huh?” Of all the things to be woke up for on a Saturday at… a glance at the clock shows it to be just after nine. Alex's blush darkens. “It's a sign of affection, you know that.”
Kara is definitely more tactile than Alex had been accustomed to. Though now that she thinks of it, kisses had yet to be a part of that equation.
“But different countries kiss in different ways, yes?” Kara demands impatiently, floating onto the end of Alex's bed.
Alex shrugs. “I mean, I guess. Fancy Europeans do that weird air-cheek thing.”
Kara makes a face. “The one without touch?”
“Yeah.”
“I think I will prefer the other kisses.”
Alex resigns herself to the rest of this conversation and sits up fully, now somewhat interested. “What brought this on, anyways?”
Kara cocks her head and Alex recognizes the look of concentration. “I was trying to filter sounds again but then I heard your name and it's some of the boys at school down at the beach - ”
Oh, hell. “Tune them out, right now,” Alex demands.
Kara pouts but the furrow between her brows reassures Alex. “All right. But I would like to ask Brad if he will help me hide my accent. I cannot detect much difference between his and yours.”
And now her new thirteen year old alien roommate is not making sense again. “Brad doesn't have an accent. He was born in Midvale, like me.”
That adorable confused look makes Alex feel warm, though Kara also looks like she wants to argue the point about Alex being accentless. “Then why is he pretending to be Australian?”
“Some people find bad accents to be funny?” Alex offers.
Kara shakes her head. “He was not changing his voice besides that squeaky crunch he sometimes makes.” The tips of her ears have started to pinken. “He expressed a desire earlier to give you an Australian kiss.”
Alex flinches backwards. The fuck, Brad?
“So how is Australian kissing different from European?”
Well shit. The one Saturday she sleeps in instead of heading down to the beach for a few hours of waves with the guys… if she had been there, Brad would have kept his mouth shut and Alex wouldn't be stuck in this conversation.
Kara fidgets and Alex realizes with growing horror that there's a list in her hand.
“Kara, look, Brad is just saying stuff. Stuff you shouldn't repeat to anybody,” Alex adds.
“Anybody but you?” appeals Kara, wide blue eyes pleading for Alex's help in understanding.
Alex sighs but affirms, “Nobody but me.”
“So you will explain the kissing?” Kara presses and Alex groans.
“Fine, whatever. Let's just get some food first and we can head out to the fort.”
-----
“Okay,” Alex starts, shutting the trapdoor to the treehouse, “you have to let me know if Mom and Dad come out here. As soon as you notice, all right?”
Kara nods eagerly, crumbs sticking to her full cheeks as she chews a piece of jam-covered toast.
“Let me see that list,” Alex demands, pen in left hand while her right reaches for the sliced fruit between them.
Kara tugs the list closer. “It is written in Kryptonian.”
Alex tries not to show her frustration, biting down fiercely on her orange slice.
Kara has been with the Danvers for months, had remained silent until she had picked up adequate English to convey her most important thoughts (questions and food), never once speaking Kryptonian where the Danvers might overhear. Alex knows she still speaks it, having awoken one night to find Kara perched on the roof outside their room, eyes skyward and lips chanting near silently. Alex had caught only a wisp of a few syllables before Kara had crawled back into the room, solemn and uncrackable.
Her written Kryptonian was guarded just as carefully and some nights Alex would briefly smell a hint of smoke as Kara set her notes and questions afire in the bathroom before sucking in the air and blowing it out their bedroom window. Their neighbor from next door had already expressed concern to Jeremiah that Alex was entering a dangerous stage of teenage rebellion.
Kara's written English had not progressed as fast as her spoken, for some reason, and Alex had been itching to get her hands on some Kryptonian to decipher.
“Fine,” Alex grits out, foiled again.
“The Australian kiss,” Kara prompts, and Alex stabs her eggs violently.
“It's - look, if anyone asks you for one, let me know so I can kick them where it hurts.”
Kara tilts her head and carefully, gently forks a mouthful of eggs off her plate. “Does it not hurt everywhere to be kicked if one is human?”
Alex grins. “Some places are more sensitive and can make people reconsider their words and actions.”
Kara just nods and glances back down at her list. “What does French kissing mean?”
“It means they want me to punch them in the face,” Alex blurts out this time, without thought.
Kara gives her a skeptical look at that, but shuffles another strip of bacon into her mouth.
“An Inuit kiss?”
“Eskimo kiss,” corrects Alex. “It's rubbing noses together. Like, the tips of your noses together. Hopefully snot-free,” she adds, just to see Kara wrinkle her own nose in disgust.
Kara hums. “What about just kisses? Do they have an original culture?”
Alex shrugs. “Even just regular kisses have lots of variation.”
“How so?”
“Well,” Alex flushes, “people all kiss differently, they have different things they like, different intensities, stuff like that.”
Kara's eyes are bright even in the shaded treehouse. “Alex, what kinds of kisses do you like?”
“I don't - I don't know how to describe that, Kara.” She fiddles with her fork.
“Show me.”
Alex's head snaps up. “What?”
Kara sets her list aside, but Alex is too stunned to scheme of a way to snatch it.
“You would not like something if it is bad,” Kara points out, seemingly sure in her trust in Alex. “So, show me what is good.”
“I,” Alex licks her lips. “Okay.”
Okay. She can do this. It's just doing what her parents want. Well, not exactly, but they asked her to help teach Kara what she needs to know. And that's what this is. A teaching moment. Alex can do this and then shove it to the back of her mind, inconsequential and never to be thought of again.
She gulps, heart pounding and breath short.
Kara sits patiently, watching Alex like she's cataloging every reaction and every beat of Alex's heart. There's a blush on Kara's cheeks, excitement bright in her eyes.
She chickens out.
She chickens out and when she leans in, she jerks her head side to side only to slow the pace and retreat when Kara's nose remains unyielding.
“Sorry,” Alex mutters towards her lap, nose twinging slightly.
Kara's hands are suddenly cupping her hot cheeks gently, and this time Kara is the one to lean in, to brush her nose softly against Alex's as they rub together, Kara's breath against her mouth and their foreheads pressed together.
“Those are not bad,” Kara decides as she pulls back. “They are… intimate.” Her hands slide down to hold Alex's. “I like sharing those with you.”
“Yeah?” croaks Alex, internally wincing when her voice tries to crack like Brad's. “I mean, me too.”
She still lets out a small “eep” when Kara moves closer again and repeats the gesture.
Still, in this moment in the treehouse with Kara, listening to her giggle at Alex's temporary lack of cool, nothing feels better.