Chapter Text
saudade
(n.) a nostalgic longing for something or someone that was loved and then lost, with the knowledge that it or they might never return, "the love that remains."
20th of November, 2017
Mon-El felt dizzy when he finally managed to regain his consciousness. Not in the intoxicated or just-woke-up kind of dizzy though. It was more like I-don’t-remember-how-I-ended-up-here kind of dizzy. He could feel that he was lying on a relatively soft surface—the cot in the DEO? He clearly remembered being in the DEO. He remembered Kara sitting by his side, holding his hand, pressing a kiss on his forehead. Just sleep, she’d whispered to him, even as he tried to talk. There was so much he had to tell her before she got too hopeful, before she thought that his return was a miracle and not deliberate. Yet he hadn’t counted the fact that he would be too out of it to focus on that. He’d been hungry, he’d been tired, he’d been sleepless, and letting her comfort him seemed too good an idea to dismiss.
But…it wasn’t the cot he was feeling underneath him. It was something else, because…he’d risen from the cot, right? He tried to go into the DEO’s storage room, to grab the device—the device he’d need to wake the other members of the Legion. But he’d been interrupted. By who, he didn’t know. By…
He pushed himself off of wherever he was lying on and opened his eyes, not knowing what to expect, until his eyes found Kara’s. She was standing behind a glass, the glass of the…cell in the DEO. Of course. He should’ve remembered.
His heart stuttered with fear and heartbreak only briefly before Kara spoke. “I don’t understand.”
He could only look away to the floor, not wanting to see the pain in her eyes. Not wanting to know that…it was him and his actions that were hurting her. The necessity of the situation didn’t change its difficulty.
“I wanna give you the benefit of the doubt, but…you attacked two agents.”
I know, Mon-El could only think as he rose from his lying position, sitting down with his back to the wall. I know. I’m sorry. I know. Everything in him wished that he could tell her that, wished he could explain everything—but he couldn’t. It was for her benefit. It was all for her. Instead he opted to stare at his hands, fearing his resolve might crumble if he looked at her…until he heard her scoff.
He hoped that his wince wasn’t too visible.
He could only lift his eyes when he heard her turn around and walk away, presumably trying to pull herself together. He knew what she was trying to do. He knew her well enough to know she wasn’t giving up and walking away. That wasn’t her, not when it came to someone she cared about. And…she cared about him, right?
Isn’t that the exact problem?
“Was… What… Were you confused by the hypersleep?” Her voice was tinted with tears in a way that pleaded him to say yes. To give her a solid explanation for his behavior. “Is that why you snuck out of the med bay, broke into a secure storage room, and almost killed two people?”
“I didn’t almost kill anyone.” He was surprised that his voice was level when he said those words, especially considering he hadn’t even thought about them. The last thing he was thinking about was killing anyone, but… She couldn’t know that, right? For her safety, she couldn’t know anything.
He suddenly felt the urge to reach to his neck and wrap his fingers around his necklace—her necklace—but he stopped himself, instead putting on a cold expression. Remember the plan, he told himself. This is the only way.
Yet still, seeing something breaking in Kara’s eyes was a harder pill to swallow than he’d imagined. She ducked her chin, desperately trying to hold herself together, to not cry—he wasn’t in much of a different shape—before she finally had it in her to speak. “Is it not you?” she asked, as one last hope. One last explanation that she could accept, that she’d be okay with, as much as it would hurt. She’d said just a couple of hours ago just how much she’d missed him, but he realized… For her, not having him back at all was better than having him back like…this. Distant, cold, secretive…
It’s for her sake.
“It’s me,” he could only whisper; the only bit of information he could reveal. As much as he didn’t feel like himself at this point.
Kara’s voice was even lower when she spoke again, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “Then… Then make me believe it,” she said—begged really. “Please.”
He opened his mouth—he was ready to say it. To say anything that would prove it was him. To tell her the things only they both could know. Their relationship, their love, the littlest things that were still branded to his mind…but he stopped himself. Too much, it would be too much. It would close the distance between them…and he couldn’t have that. Not now, maybe not ever.
He only looked away, feeling guilt churning in his stomach.
“You know I don’t sleep anymore?” she continued finally, her words more of a statement than a response to his words. Her voice, tearful voice—she was outright crying now—almost broke through his resolve—almost, if there hadn’t been one thing that scared him much more than her heartbreak could. “I lay awake at night, just staring at the ceiling, because if I close my eyes, I dream about you dying.”
He stared at his hands, willing himself not to cry, willing himself to hold on just for a couple of more minutes. A couple more minutes, and then she’d be gone. She shouldn’t see how much he was hurting. She shouldn’t see how much this affected him as well.
“I s-see you dis-disappear into the blackness o-of space forever.” She covered her mouth in an attempt to suppress her sobs, and every cell in his body just wanted to reach out and embrace her. Pull her into his embrace, stroke her hair, tell her just how much he—
No, he thought as he clenched his teeth. No, you can’t. Remember what will happen. You can’t.
Yet…that didn’t mean it took everything in him to keep a straight face at her plea.
“This was all I wanted,” she continued, a small sob escaping her lips. Her voice was shaking so much that he knew she was in the brink of sobbing. “This,” she repeated, gesturing at him with shaky hands. “And—And when I saw you on that ship… Oh my God, I felt like I could hope again. I could touch you, and see you, and hear you, and be with you, finally.”
I’m sorry, he thought desperately as he watched her step closer, tears shining in her eyes, so much so that it was a miracle they hadn’t slipped down her cheeks yet. It was a miracle he wasn’t crying, too. I’m sorry. He wished he could offer her more than a damn apology.
She adjusted her glasses and pressed her fingers on her temple briefly, as if to pull herself together, before she opened her mouth. “I… You—You’re different.”
You don’t know what I’ve been through, he thought as he clenched his fists. You don’t know what I know. Anyone with an enormous weight on their shoulders, he thought, would be different.
And there was a time he promised himself he’d be the person she’d want him to be. And there was a time he actually thought they could be together again. It turned out to be nothing but wishful thinking.
“You have nothing to say?” she asked finally, anger seeping through her pain into her voice.
I can’t, Kara. I can’t. You have to believe me. I can’t.
He lifted his head to look at Kara, the words at the top of his tongue. He could say them. He could say them easily, he could let her in, but…
“Nothing?”
“I’m sorry,” were the only words that left his mouth. As if an empty apology could mean anything.
He could almost see the shift in emotion in her. Her eyes, pleading and pained merely seconds ago, turned angry—no, not even angry, cold. She scoffed with disbelief; not that he could fault her for it. Not that this wasn’t exactly what he was aiming for.
“Shame on me for having a human heart.” That was the last thing she said, her voice clipped and distant, before she turned around and left.
She hadn’t stayed long enough to see the single tear that managed to escape from his eyes.