Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Alex Danvers was a badass. 

There was no disputing that fact.

In all her years at the DEO she had seen it all, and there were very few things that managed to catch her off guard at this point. So imagine her surprise when something actually did manage to catch her off guard, and she wasn’t even discovering some new and horrendous alien menace that threatened her little sister’s life.

No, instead she was at home, sitting on her couch with her leg in a cast. She was still mentally processing the text she just got from Maggie, while simultaneously trying to lend a listening ear to Ruby’s troubles.

“There’s this girl at my school, Erika Morrison.”

Alex nodded, seriously waiting for Ruby to explain her problem.

“I think I like her.”

Alex blinked a few times. “You… like her? As in…” Alex looked on in disbelief as Ruby just nodded.

Yeah. Definitely didn’t see that coming. She actively forced her jaw muscles to keep her chin from hitting the floor, and cleared her throat.

“Are, um… are- are you sure? I mean… how do you know?”

The blushing girl actually laughed shyly at that, keeping her head down all the time. “Aren’t you the one who’s supposed to know how this feels?”

“Yes… I- I mean, of course!”

Right, she was supposed to be the all-knowing aunt here. Although Maggie was probably better suited to being the wise old lesbian in this scenario. No! Bad Danvers! Don’t think about your own problems right now! She needed to be mature and give grown-up advice about relationships. Relationships of the gay kind. Even though she’d only ever had one of those. Maybe don’t bring up that particular statistic.

No, wait, one and a half! Counting the whole Sarah Lance thing. Yeah… definitely don’t bring that up.

“Right…” Alex started, “so… I know how hard it is. You start second guessing all these feelings and you keep wondering-”

“I want to tell her.”

Alex blinked, once again focusing most of her attention on her jaw muscles keeping it together. “You want to just… tell her?”

“Yeah. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do when you like someone?”

Alex stared for a second, her jaw muscles finally failing her, as she gaped at the supposedly shy girl’s sudden display of courage. She sure seemed to be handling this whole ‘liking a girl’ thing a lot better than she had. “Well… I… I guess so, yes, but…” Alex frowned in confusion, “…but if you’re already so sure about this… then why did you call it a problem?”

“Because my mom never has time for anything anymore.” Ruby hung her head down and shuffled her feet around. “She’s all caught up in her new job and we barely talk” she muttered. “So that’s why I kind of need your help.”

Alex sat up straighter, nodding her head. “Anything.” She was already mentally preparing herself to go up to bat for Ruby against her mom, but the girl once again managed to catch her off guard.

“I need you to drive me.”

At this point, Alex didn’t even try to hide her surprise anymore because whatever her expectations, it was becoming apparent that her and Ruby were on completely different wavelengths. “You need me to… drive you?” she asked confused.

“To Erika’s house.” Ruby hopped off the couch and looked at her expectantly.

“Wait, you… you want to go and tell her right now?”

Ruby just nodded, while Alex was left staring at her with wide eyes. Ruby seemed to be incredibly eager to go on this expedition, and Alex didn’t think she’d ever seen her quite this excited. Except maybe when she’d told the girl about the time Supergirl had caught her after jumping out of a building.

“Ruby… my leg is fractured. I can’t drive.”

“Oh.” The girl visibly deflated. “I totally didn’t think of that.”

Alex tensed as she saw something terrible happening. Something inconceivable and incredibly scary. Ruby was starting to pout. This was not a drill, Ruby was deploying an honest-to-god, Kara Danvers-level pout. Alex tried to look away with all her might, but the untameable dark force of The Pout was sucking her in and before long, Alex found herself succumbing to its ominous power.

“Hang on,” she sighed in defeat while grabbing her phone, “I’ll call back-up.”

It didn’t take very long for a car to come to a stop in front of the Morrison residence. To be more precise, the car approached slightly too fast before making an abrupt stop, the engine suddenly turning off and just staying in place. Completely diagonal to the sidewalk.

“We’re here!”

Kara smiled widely as she turned around and looked at the back seat of the car, where Alex and Ruby were looking back at her, each with similar horrified expressions.

“Why would you let her drive your car?” Ruby asked Alex in a shaky voice.

“I didn’t think it through,” Alex hissed in a whispered tone and finally relaxing the vice grip she’d had on the overhead handle. “It’s been so long, that I must have repressed the memories of exactly how badly she drives.”

“Hey! You know I can hear you, right?!” Kara seemed highly offended by their assessment of her driving skills but Alex couldn’t really bring herself to care right now, as she was more focused on keeping her lunch inside her stomach. Her shaking hand opened the door as she stepped outside, fumbling with her crutches.

“Do you… not drive often, or something?” Ruby asked concerned, as she stepped after Alex and onto the curb.

“Not really,” Kara responded, as she stepped out of the car as well. “I mean, after I got my license I didn’t really do anything with it.”

“Thank god” Alex mumbled, causing Ruby to chuckle nervously.

“But now I don’t really need it anyway, I usually just fly everywhere.”

A solid three seconds of silence passed before Kara caught sight of Alex’s deadly glare.

“On my bike” she added quickly.

Alex scrunched her eyes closed in frustration before throwing a worried glance in Ruby’s direction. The girl was frowning at Kara because come on, even a twelve-year-old would know something was up with that!!

Alex cleared her throat and quickly changed the subject. “So are you sure you want to do this?” she asked carefully, as Ruby turned to look at her. “I mean, this isn’t something you should just rush into.”

“Of course I’m sure!”

Kara seemed confused as she looked from one frowning face to the other. “What is going on, exactly?” she asked. “Are you guys gonna tell me what we’re doing here?”

“It’s private,” Alex stated firmly, “it was nice of you to drive us but-”

“I’m here to tell Erika I like her” Ruby said promptly. Once again, Alex was taken aback by how upfront she was being about all this. “And maybe… to ask… if she wants to be my girlfriend.” For the first time today, Ruby seemed to actually be slightly embarrassed, ducking her head and turning slightly red in the face.

“Okay, okay, slow down” Alex interjected, her protective mode kicking in and immediately imagining horrible scenarios of heartbreak and rejection. Which were just reasonable considerations to take into account and had nothing to do with her own personal experience. Nope. Nothing to do with that at all.

“Maybe leave the girlfriend part for another time, you don’t want to spring too much on her right off the-”

“Oh my god, that is so great!!” Kara started bouncing up and down on her toes as she let out a squeal and stepped next to Ruby, brimming with excitement as she started firing off questions. (Alex rolled her eyes, because she actually squealed.) “How long have you known?! Like, when did you realise?! Is she cute?! How would you figure out that you like a girl anyway?!”

Alex was starting to get worried at the two excited balls of energy getting each other even more worked up, but Ruby seemed to be shocked for a moment.

“Wait… what do you mean ‘how would you figure out if you like a girl’?” Ruby looked from Alex, to Kara, and back again. “Don’t you two talk about stuff? Do you…” she suddenly gasped, her eyes going wide as she motioned Alex to get closer before whispering into her ear; “Does she not know you had a girlfriend?!”

Alex snorted as she straightened up. “What?! Of course she knew I had a girlfriend!”

“Yeah, but she didn’t want to talk about it.” Kara crossed her arms as she shook her head, turning to Ruby in exasperation. “She just refused to tell me how she realised she had feelings for Maggie.”

“Really?” Ruby turned to face Alex with a frown. “Why?”

“It’s- it’s just… private, okay?” Alex stammered. “People don’t talk about that stuff.”

“I’m talking about it” Ruby countered.

“It’s not the same!”

“Why not?”

“JUST BECAUSE!!”

Alex’s face was now turning a very dark shade of red, because her and Ruby realising their feelings for their respective ladies were two completely different stories. At least she hoped they were. She highly doubted that Ruby’s realisation had started with some very vivid dreams about Maggie Sawyer sprawled out on top of a pool table with a suspicious lack of clothes on her.

Good times…

Oh, screw it!

If Sawyer wanted her passport back she could come and get it herself! And if Alex would just happen to be wearing that ridiculously tight red top that she knew for a fact drove the detective nuts then that was Maggie’s problem, not hers!

“Told you, she’s totally stubborn” Kara sighed, shaking her head. “So what about Erika?” she asked, becoming all smiles again and turning back towards Ruby.

“She’s just…” Ruby giggled as she fidgeted with her fingers, “we- we’ve kind of been friends for a while. But… I don’t know, I just… wanted to see her all the time, you know? Like, everything is always better when she’s around.”

“But… that’s normal, right?” Kara asked hesitantly. “I mean, everyone likes seeing their friends.”

“Well, yeah, but not like this! Every time I’m in second period I just can’t pay attention anymore, because I know I’ll get to see Erika in math class the next period. Do you understand that? She makes me look forward to math! And I hate math! And then when we’re in third period I can forget about learning anything in there too, because…” Ruby hesitated for a moment, looking at the floor, “…I’ll just end up staring at Erika all the time. I mean… she… she’s just…” the girl huffed out a breath, “…she’s just so pretty.”

Wow…

Alex raised her eyebrows, huffing out an incredulous breath. This girl had it bad. Like, really bad. She was about to comment on it, when Kara suddenly said one of the most asinine thing she’d ever heard coming out of her mouth. Which was saying something, because she’d made some pretty outlandish remarks when she’d just arrived on this planet.

“Yeah, but it’s normal to think your friends are pretty, right?” Kara darted her eyes between Alex and Ruby, not sure why they were looking at her like that. “I mean… if you have a really pretty friend… it’s normal to notice.” (For example, who wouldn’t notice how good Lena looked all the time? Rao, you’d have to be blind or something!)

“Uuuuuh no,” Ruby said firmly. “It’s definitely not. Besides, it’s not just that. We text each other all the time, for no reason. Maybe it’s weird, but the first thing I do when I wake up is text Erika. She’s just… the first thing I think about every day… and the last…”

“But… but…” Kara darted her eyes back and forward, looking confused for some reason, “…that’s what friends are for” she muttered weakly.

“No,” Ruby said decisively, seemingly steeling herself as she turned to look at Erika’s house, “that’s what girlfriends are for! You don’t just count the minutes until you get to see your friend again. You don’t get goose bumps when a friend touches you, and you don’t look at her lips all the time and think about kissing her. When… when Erika smiles at me, or- or talks to me or… whatever she does, my heart always starts beating like crazy! When you feel something like that, it’s definitely not because you’re friends. It’s because I want her to be my girlfriend!”

Ruby nodded to herself as she looked at Erika’s house. To say that Alex was impressed was a massive understatement, as she looked proudly at the girl’s determined expression. Neither of them were looking at Kara, which is why neither of them noticed the alien woman’s mouth hanging wide open as she stared off into the distance with a distinctly shocked expression on her face.

If Ruby and Alex could’ve heard Kara’s thoughts, they would have suffered permanent hearing damage due to the thunderous sound of the penny finally dropping.

“I have to go.”

Alex blinked in confusion as she looked back at her sister, who suddenly turned around and started walking away. “Wait… what? Kara!” She hobbled after her on her crutches. “Where are you going?!”

“I just…” Kara momentarily stopped to turn and face her sister, “…I need to talk to Lena. Like, right now.”

“Lena?” Alex gave her a completely flabbergasted look, having no idea what was going on. “Why would you have to-”

Kara clearly wasn’t listening anymore as she suddenly shot up into the sky and flew away, leaving a few cracks in the pavement.

“Hey!!” Alex shouted after her. “You can’t just leave us here!! Who’s gonna drive us home?!”

Alex let out an incredulous breath at her sister’s inexplicable antics. She was shaking her head and muttering to herself when she gingerly turned around, steadying herself with her crutches, before suddenly freezing in shock at the sight of Ruby.

The girl was staring in disbelief at the spot where Kara had just taken off, silently opening and closing her mouth like a goldfish, as she pointed a shaking finger at the cracks in the sidewalk.

“She… she…” Ruby swallowed harshly, looking back at Alex, “…your sister can fly!” she squeaked out.

Oh, crap…

Chapter Text

Lena stood in the middle of her L-Corp office, her arms crossed as she regarded her assistant. Very slowly, she could feel her previous sense of aggravation at Sam’s radio silence steadily turning into concern. Because emergencies happened all the time, sure, but someone like Sam suddenly going off the radar without any sort of explanation like this, was starting to feel more and more like foul play.

“Are you sure?” Lena asked intently, raising her eyebrows as she watched Jess nervously fiddle with her tablet.

“Yes, I’m sure Ms. Luthor. She never got in the car.”

Lena sighed. “Just… keep trying to track her down, please.”

Jess nodded before swiftly exiting the office, while Lena took out her phone and sent what had to be about the hundredth message to Sam. This was not like her at all. Why would she just disappear like that? Lena sighed as she moved to sit at her desk. (Or should she call it Sam’s desk? The line was kind of blurred at this point.)

She started looking around the stack of papers in front of her, searching for possible clues on her CFO’s whereabouts, when she suddenly heard a very loud thud against the window behind her. Lena immediately swivelled around in her chair, holding her breath for whatever new threat was awaiting her today, but she was instead met with a very bizarre sight.

Kara Danvers. Lying on the balcony on her stomach. With her glasses all crooked and the side of her face squished against the glass window.

As if she’d just flown straight into it.

Now, Lena wasn’t stupid. She was very well aware of the fact that Kara was Supergirl, and by now she’d gotten over her disappointment that her best friend apparently didn’t trust her. But despite getting used to the flimsy excuses that Kara pulled out to explain her Super Situations, she had to say that this certainly marked a new low in the woman’s pathetic attempts at being sneaky.

“Lena!”

Kara scurried to her feet, opening the window and stepping inside very fast. Inhumanly fast.

“Do you have a minute?! I really need to talk to you!”

“Do I have a minute?” Lena asked incredulously. “You mean you didn’t rush over here because I’m in some sort of danger?”

“What?! No!!” Kara frowned in confusion. “Why would you be in danger?!”

Lena’s eyebrows raised at the woman’s complete obliviousness. “Well… that’s usually the case when someone suddenly makes an unannounced entrance through my balcony window.” Lena looked on, completely bewildered by her friend’s complete lack of self-awareness.

No wonder Alex always seemed so stressed.

“Any particular way you got up there, by the way?” Lena smirked, despite the weird situation. “Did they bring back those flying busses again?”

“Yeah, sure, why not.”

Okay, now Lena definitely knew something was wrong. Even Kara Danvers in her most puppy-like state wouldn’t be this careless about her secret, right? Lena was already formulating some sort of acceptable way to assess Kara’s wellbeing (or god forbid, her identity, because, you know, shape-shifters were apparently a thing), but Kara suddenly blurted out a very odd question.

“Lena, do you like me?”

The youngest Luthor was momentarily stunned into silence. “What are you talking about? Of course I like you; you’re my best friend.”

“No, that’s not…” Kara sighed deeply, pushing up her glasses and seeming extremely flustered. Even more than usual, that is. “I just… there’s… Ruby said some stuff…”

“Ruby?!” Lena asked incredulously. This was now turning into a game of random word association.

“Yeah, she… she realised she likes someone, apparently.” Kara cleared her throat as she  fiddled with her fingers. “And she… she said some stuff that… well, it sounded kind of familiar.”

“Kara, you’re making less and less sense every time you open your mouth.”

Kara let out something between a huff and a groan. “Okay, so… Ruby went to tell this girl that she liked her, right? And then she said that she knew she liked her because she always wanted to be with her, and because she thinks of her every morning and every night and because she thinks she’s very pretty, and because her heart always beats faster whenever she sees her, or sees her do anything or nothing, right?”

“Wait, Ruby likes a gi-”

“But then I thought, ‘that doesn’t make any sense’. Because, like, everybody thinks those things about their friends. Or well, at least their best friend. But Ruby was all like, ‘no definitely not, if you feel like that, that means you like someone’. So then I was kinda shocked, because I thought that maybe she was right, and that would mean that I like you, in like a more than friends kind of way, and then I thought I should really talk to you about it and then I flew here and then I told you that. I mean, this. I told you all this. Now.”

Lena just looked on for a second, letting the silence hang in the air after Kara’s extended rambling. She realised that there were several reasons to be happy right now. For one, Kara had just casually admitted to flying here, which meant she finally trusted her, right? Although this could also just be Kara being a total airhead when it came to keeping a secret. More importantly, and the reason for greater joy, was the other admission she’d just made. About liking her as more than a friend. For some reason, however, it made Lena suddenly see red with anger as her face twitched in a valiant pursuit to keep her emotions at bay.

She did not succeed.

“SERIOUSLY?!!” Lena exclaimed, letting all her frustration out. “THAT’S WHAT IT TOOK?!! AN ENTIRE YEAR OF ME AGGRESSIVELY FLIRTING WITH YOU GIVES YOU NO CLUE, BUT A TWELVE-YEAR-OLD GETS A CRUSH AND SUDDENLY YOU OPEN YOUR EYES?!!”

“What?!” Kara squeaked, completely stunned. “You- you’ve been flirting with me?! When?!”

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN ‘WHEN’?! ALL THE GODDAMN TIME!!” Lena took a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself down, as she looked into Kara’s thoroughly confused eyes. “You think I go around giving everyone smouldering looks?! You think I give just anyone unlimited access to my office?! You think I would send just anyone a room full of flowers?!” She paused a moment, hoping Kara would have something intelligible to say.

Turns out she didn’t; Kara just stood there, gaping at the CEO.

“A room full, Kara!!” the youngest Luthor exclaimed. “A goddamn. Room. FULL. OF. FLOWERS!!” She huffed out a breath in complete exasperation. “I took you out to every fancy and less-than-fancy place in town for lunch and dinner!! I paraded my ex around to make you jealous and to get you to make a move!! I bought CatCo so you wouldn’t lose your job, and I wear ridiculously uncomfortable clothes to work!! Do you seriously think that any sane person would go to work wearing revealing dresses, unless they’re trying to show off certain body parts to an obtuse reporter?! Hell, I even tried to make you jealous with James and still nothing!! But all I needed to do from the start was to get Ruby a girlfriend?! Seriously?!”

“Wait…” Kara frowned as she finally remembered words again, “…you were dating James to make me jealous?!”

“Obviously!! And I’m pretty sure that you’re the only CatCo employee who didn’t figure that out!” Lena huffed. “I don’t know how things work on your planet, Supergirl, but around here kissing is supposed to be enjoyable, not look deeply uncomfortable.”

Kara let out a forced laugh. “Wha- planet?! Super- I- I’m not- me… me earthling-”

“OH COME ON, YOU JUST ADMITTED TO FLYING HERE!!”

Kara groaned and hung her head. “Okay, fine yes, I’m Supergirl.”

Lena watched with an incredulous expression as Kara lifted her head and gave her an intent look. “That’s it?!” she exclaimed. “All this time you don’t trust me, and now you’re just giving away your secret just like that?!”

“Of course I trusted you!! But that’s not important right now…”

“Oh really?! The fact that you’re Supergirl is not important?!”

“No,” Kara said decisively as she stepped closer, “not right now…”

“Meaning there’s something more important than you lying to me all this time?!”

“Yes.”

“What in the actual hell could be more important?!”

“The fact I really wanna kiss you right now.”

Lena’s pre-emptively charged up response died in her throat, instead coming out as a strange, strangled sound. She still wanted very much to yell at the woman, but Kara was now standing a lot closer than before and she was unabashedly staring at her lips.

This was not fair.

“I’m still mad at you” Lena whispered, unconsciously biting her lip.

“Okay.” Kara gave a small nod, now standing close enough for the two to feel each other’s breath.

“And… you’re gonna have to… explain a lot… and probably apologise, too…”

“I can do that” Kara whispered, taking off her glasses and dropping them to the floor.

“And- and- don’t think you can just end every argument with-”

The rest of her words died on Kara’s lips. The very lips that had suddenly locked with her own.

It took Lena’s brain 2.73 seconds to process that information.

OH MY GOD, KARA WAS KISSING HER!! THIS WAS NOT A DRILL, KARA DANVERS WAS KISSING HER ON THE LIPS AND IT WAS DEFINITELY NOT A DREAM THIS TIME!!

Lena let out a whimper (something she would later vehemently deny), before responding with full force. Her hands found Kara’s sides, while the blonde’s hands ended up tangled in her hair as they kissed each other with a feverish urgency. They kissed like two people who should’ve probably done this a long time ago. Like two people who should’ve, respectively, not danced around the problem and not been so oblivious.

“Wait, wait!!” Lena suddenly pulled back.

Kara stepped back, doing her best impression of a kicked puppy, while Lena hurriedly reached for her phone and tried to break the world record for ‘fastest text sending’.

“Okay, I’m good,” Lena huffed, tossing her phone away, before mashing her face together with Kara’s again. This time it was Kara’s turn to whimper as Lena flung her arms around the woman’s neck, causing Kara to stumble forward. The alien woman was more than capable of sustaining the CEO’s weight, yet somehow Lena still got pushed up against her desk and then down with her back on top of it. Kara was now completely pinning her down on the desk, and Lena started spreading her legs, and OH GOD THIS WAS ABOUT TO HAPPEN!! THIS WAS ACTUALLY-

They were both suddenly startled by the sound of Kara’s phone buzzing.

“Shoot!” Kara stood back up, taking out her phone and wincing at what it was displaying, while Lena propped herself up on her elbows. “I’m… I’m sorry, Lena, I totally forgot I was supposed to go to- to this blue star and I… it’s a- a Supergirl thing…” Kara was giving her a pleading look, hoping she would understand, and Lena just smirked back at her.

“Well, why don’t you take care of that as quickly as possible?” she teased in a breathless voice. “You wouldn’t want to keep me waiting… would you?” She proceeded to lift her right leg and stroke her foot up and down the side of Kara’s leg. There was a loud cracking sound, as Kara’s phone was pulverized into a million pieces by the superhero’s tightened grip. She also visibly shivered. Oh, this was going to be fun…

“Yes… I’ll… I’ll… go do that. Now. I will… take care of that and then… then…”

“And then you’ll take care of me?” Lena asked almost innocently. Almost.

Kara suddenly stilled, seemingly gaining some control over her flustered state, as she fixed Lena with a very serious look. “Always” she responded solemnly.

Oh, come on, that was not fair! It was Lena’s turn now to stammer and turn even redder than she was, because of course the innuendo would go straight over her pretty blonde head, but still, goddammit who gave Kara the right  to flip the tables on her?!

Lena swallowed, trying to regain her faculties. “Go get ‘em, Supergirl” she finally forced out.

The blonde woman beamed back at her with a classic Kara Danvers smile as she just nodded, breathing heavily, and started backing away. Lena was just lifting herself from her desk and Kara had just reached the balcony, when the alien woman suddenly stopped in her tracks and turned back around. “Wait!” she exclaimed, stepping back to Lena, “I forgot something!”

“What did you-”

Kara suddenly darted in and stole one last kiss, before grinning at her and disappearing out of the window behind a gust of wind. Lena huffed incredulously, her heart still hammering away, as she laughed at Kara’s antics. Who knew Kara Danvers was capable of being a tease? She better come back soon from that mission of hers…

Lena tried to steady herself as she turned around and started making her desk presentable again, despite her immense joy being very distracting. Oh, wait! She should probably make herself presentable again, too. She quickly fixed  her hair, which had been thoroughly messed up by Kara’s hands, redoing her ponytail, before straightening her skirt to an acceptable position. She had just resumed adjusting the papers on the desk, when Jess walked back into the office.

“Ms. Luthor, the people from FritzTech have agreed to let you participate through videoconference, replacing Ms. Arias.”

“Thank you Jess, I’ll take it in here.”

“Um… Ms. Luthor?”

Lena looked back up, noticing Jess still standing there with an almost imperceptible frown in place. “What is it?” Lena asked impatiently.

“You, um… might want to clean yourself up first.”

Lena’s hands immediately went to her head, checking for any loose hairs that she missed when redoing her hair. She looked down at her clothes, but found nothing out of the ordinary. “Would you mind being more specific?” Lena asked, some aggravation slipping into her voice at her assistant being critical of her appearance.

“Well, the thing is… your lipstick is all over your face.”

Oh, crap.

Lena’s veins froze, as she quickly pulled a drawer out of her desk and checked the mirror inside of it, only to find that Jess was right. The bottom half of her face was completely smudged with the remains of her faded red lipstick. Shit.

“Aha, ha, yes… that- that-” Lena quickly found a handkerchief, aggressively cleaning her face with it, “that happened just now… when… when I… I…” come on Lena, you’re supposed to be a genius! Say something! “...I ate… an apple… and… wasn’t very careful…”

Jess didn’t respond, as she kept looking at her with an unreadable expression.

Lena looked back.

“I see,” the assistant said slowly, “and I suppose those glasses are there so you can try going for a new look?”

Lena’s eyes darted sideways as she looked beside her desk where, indeed, Kara’s glasses were still lying on the floor. Lena gulped as she looked back at Jess. “Um… yes.”

Jess kept looking at her with that stoic expression in place.

Lena ignored her racing heart as she looked back.

Jess squinted her eyes ever so slightly as she kept looking.

Lena didn’t blink.

“Alright, then. I’ll let you know when the people at FritzTech are ready for you. ” Jess suddenly turned around and walked out of the office.

Lena let out a sigh of relief when the door closed behind her. She’d nearly slipped up there. But she was a Luthor, so obviously she was great at deceiving people! It was a good thing that Kara trusted her now; that way Lena could finally teach her a few things about being secretive. You’ll see; between the two of them, they would make sure all Kara’s excuses were airtight, just like Lena’s had been right now!

Meanwhile, just outside Lena’s office, Jess shook her head as she sat back down at her desk. She couldn’t help smiling at the thought of Ms. Danvers hiding somewhere in Ms. Luthor’s office and completely forgetting that she’d left her glasses on the floor. Jess just laughed as she shook her head, the image of her boss almost getting caught red-handed still fresh in her memory. She muttered to herself as she resumed her work:

“Sure took them long enough…”  

“And then I totally outsmarted that blue guy!! You should have seen his face, it was awesome!! First he was all smug about future technology and how our equipment was no good and… and how…” Winn faltered as he caught sight of James’ shell shocked expression on the other side of the booth, while staring at his phone. “Um… James,” he started unsurely, “you alright there, buddy?”

“I…” he blinked a couple times, before looking back and forward between Winn and his phone, “…I think I just got dumped.”

“Lena dumped you via text?” Winn asked confused. “And how is there doubt?”

“Well… I…” James shook his head, still seeming highly shocked as he turned his phone towards Winn, “…I don’t know, man, you tell me.” Winn frowned as he looked at the text on display.

Lena L: <Kara kissed me. we’re done>

“Ooooooh,” Winn laughed as he shook his head, “that totally makes sense! Dude, you should’ve told me you and Lena were just pretend-dating to make Kara jealous! I could have helped! And I wouldn’t have had to worry about what a weird couple you two made, I mean it was just borderline gross how… how…” Winn once again faltered as he noticed James staring back at him with a completely blank expression. “Wait, you… you were not fake dating?!”

James just shook his head, still seeming completely shocked.

“Well, I… I…” Winn nervously cleared his throat, “I… I’m sorry, dude, but… you can’t really fault me for assuming. I mean, you guys had like zero chemistry.” He let out a nervous chuckle as he reached for his beer.

“Yeah… I know.”

Winn almost choked on his drink as he coughed loudly. “You knew?!” he asked with wide eyes, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “Then why’d you date her anyway?!”

James raised his eyebrows, giving his friend an exasperated, almost condescending look. “Alright, Winn, picture this: Lena Luthor is standing in your office and, out of nowhere, she starts making out with you. Do you, A: Tell her you make no sense as a couple and that dating would probably be a bad idea? Or, B: You just go along with it, and pray that you get to kiss her as often as possible before she comes to her senses?”

Winn just blinked as he looked at his friend.

James looked back.

“Okay, fair point…”

Chapter Text

Maggie had no idea what she was doing.

When you were only two months removed from a very painful and heart-wrenching break up, you were not supposed to come running to your ex when they give you a call. Even when they claim that it’s an emergency, and even when you’re about to get off work soon anyway. And yet, here she was; driving her patrol car through some residential area and trying to find the address that Alex had just mentioned to her. While also internally cursing herself for being so weak when her lady was in distress.

Ex!! Ex-lady!!

Damn, she really should have that down by now.

She got to the right place, she parked behind some idiot’s car who apparently thought it was completely acceptable to park diagonally to the sidewalk, and got out onto the curb. When she spotted Alex a few feet away, sitting on the pavement, she started walking up to her but she abruptly slowed down when she noticed two very strange things.

One: Alex had her leg in a cast, and two: There was a kid sitting next to her, softly crying.

Now, there were a number of reasonable questions that this situation could evoke. Like: ‘What happened to Alex’s leg?’ or ‘Why are they sitting on the sidewalk in the middle of the suburbs?’ or ‘Why is that girl so sad?’ Maggie’s mind, however, seemed to have no interest in being reasonable. Because in Maggie’s mind, there were only two questions that immediately popped up: ‘Who’s the bastard that hurt my bae?’ and ‘Where did she get a kid so fast?’

Alex looked up and noticed Maggie just standing there. “Hey, Maggie,” she called out, carefully getting up and leaning on her crutches, while guiding the teary-eyed girl to her feet as well, “thanks for picking us up.”

“Is that what I’m doing?” Maggie asked, valiantly trying to get over her initial shock as she watched Alex and the girl step closer to her car. “Because you weren’t very specific on the phone.”

“I was in the middle of something,” Alex whispered intently while not so subtly gesturing to the sniffling girl. “Kara drove us, but she… suddenly took off with no reasonable explanation.”

“She flew off,” the girl suddenly mumbled, as Maggie gave her a curious look. “Literally.”

Maggie was now getting more and more weirded out by this situation. Not only did Alex magically get a kid from somewhere, but apparently we were now already disclosing the whole Supergirl thing to her. Maggie was frowning, feeling very suspicious. And that wasn’t at all about being jealous that Alex chose not to share the Supergirl thing with her when they were together. No way. Nothing to do with that at all. Probably…

“Well… you know how it is,” Maggie started, still frowning at the curious sight, “when the city needs Supergirl…”

The girl’s head suddenly shot up, giving Maggie a wide eyed look, despite her tears. “What?! Kara is Supergirl?!”

Oops…

Alex closed her eyes and groaned, before shooting Maggie a foul look. “Way to go, Sawyer.”

“Wha- I didn’t-”

Alex was already stepping past her, guiding the girl into the back seat of Maggie’s car, before taking a seat next to her. Maggie rolled her eyes as she got in behind the wheel and started the engine. That’s what you get when you come running to your damsel in distress like a lost puppy, she thought bitterly. You get a good look at your girlfriend’s new happy family life, that’s what happens.

Ex!! Ex-girlfriend!!

Goddamn it…

The entire drive was highly uncomfortable. Maggie tried to keep her eyes on the road, but she occasionally threw a glance towards the back through her rear view mirror. Alex seemed to be constantly consoling the girl, but the only thing Maggie managed to hear was that the girl was apparently called Ruby, and that… ‘it gets better.’

Whatever that meant.

When they arrived at their destination (yet another random house in the suburbs), Maggie just sat still for a moment after she shut off the engine. She looked at the disgustingly spacious house, wondering if this meant she would have to drive her highness to her apartment after this. Unless… unless Alex had already moved in with someone else. Someone rich enough to own this gigantic house.

She was not getting angry, she was not getting angry, she was definitely not getting angry and DAMN IT, SAWYER, DON’T GET ANGRY!

She turned in her seat to face the back. “So what are we-” she fell silent, as she was met with a door closing in her face and her two passengers walking up to the house without even looking back at her.

“Hey!”

Maggie aggressively wrestled her way out of the safety belt before getting out of the car because yeah, she was definitely angry now. “Danvers!” She made her way up the steps of the porch, while the duo had already made it inside, completely ignoring the detective. Maggie entered the house, finding Alex in the living room as she was patting Ruby’s shoulder who was sitting on the couch. Maggie was just about to make her indignation known, when Alex suddenly turned around and hobbled in the detective’s direction.

“Can you keep an eye on her for a second?”

Maggie blinked a few times as her anger mixed with disbelief. Then she blinked some more. Because this had to be some kind of joke, right?

“Are you out of your mind, Danvers?!” she hissed through her teeth. “First you make me drive across town with no explanation, and now you want me to be your babysitter?! You really want to rub this having kids thing in my face that badly?!”

“Get your head out of your ass, Sawyer!” Alex hissed back, throwing a worried glance back to the living room. “Not everything that happens in my life is about you! This is about Ruby, and her getting her heart trampled on by some stuck-up girl, who I really wanted to throw into solitary confinement!”

Maggie was dumbfounded for a moment, because that would not have been her first guess on what was going on. Or her twentieth.

“I’m about as thrilled as you are about this situation,” Alex continued, “but Ruby shouldn’t be alone right now, so would it kill you to just keep an eye on her for one minute?! That’s all I’m asking! After that you can go ahead and leave the country, or go on vacation, or whatever the hell you need your passport for!”

Maggie swallowed as she processed the information. “It’s just a… prisoner being extradited from Mexico,” Maggie mumbled, “I’ll be right back after transferring him…” she huffed out a short laugh, “if I can ever get my passport back, that is.”

“Yeah, yeah, we’ll talk about that, now just go sit with Ruby,” Alex grumbled as she started wobbling away on her crutches.

“Wait… where are you going?”

“I have to pee!!” Alex hissed, “Can I go now, or do you want me to wet myself?!”

“Geez, fine, fine. Relax, Danvers.”

Alex just huffed out a breath as she made her way towards the bathroom, while Maggie turned around and hesitantly stepped next to the couch that Ruby was sitting on. The girl wasn’t crying anymore, but she was just staring ahead with a very distant look in her eyes. Maggie understood that theoretically she should be able to relate to her, what with the baby gay heartbreak and everything, but the fact of the matter was that she was still a kid. And Maggie just didn’t do very well with kids. She nervously cleared her throat as she took a seat next to the girl.

“So, um… I didn’t really introduce myself back there… I’m Maggie Sawyer.”

“Yeah, I know,” Ruby responded softly, “Alex told me who you are… I’m Ruby.”

“Right.” Maggie nodded, as she regarded the girl for a second. The silence lasted a little too long to be comfortable. “So…” Maggie scrambled for a conversation topic, “…is- is, um… is this your house?” Ruby just nodded, not really looking at Maggie. “I see… your mom she, um… she… must have an… interesting job.” Maggie winced, because damn, Sawyer, this is awkward!

“I guess…” the girl sniffed as she wiped her nose, “I mean Lena is cool and everything, so that’s nice…”

“Lena?! You mean… your mother works for Lena Luthor?!” Ruby just nodded in response, while Maggie suddenly remembered that weird night when she and Alex were supposed to hang out with Kara and Lena. She’d genuinely thought that those two had finally gotten their shit together and that it was going to be a double date kind of thing. But instead Lena had shown up with some other woman. An objectively gorgeous woman, who Maggie would’ve loved to hang out with, except for three glaring problems.

One: Maggie already had a girlfriend, one she loved a lot, thank you very much.

Two: The woman wouldn’t shut up about her daughter, and kids had not been her favourite subject back then and still weren’t now.

Three: She wouldn’t shut up about guys. Even Lena had joined in on the off-putting conversation. Which she’d found very strange, because that Luthor woman  made her gaydar go off like a blaring fire alarm.

“Wait, so,” Maggie frowned at the girl next to her on the couch as her brain slowly put the pieces together, “your mom is that… Samantha Alias woman?”

“Arias.”

“What?”

“Arias. Her last name is Arias.”

“Well, that’s just… just…” Maggie really wanted to finish that sentence with the word stupid, but kids were, like, sensitive or something, right? “…great. She’s… great.”

“You know her?” Ruby asked confused.

“Well, I… met her once yes, she… she seems like…”

A bitch. A girlfriend-stealing bitch. A siren who lures in heartbroken lesbians with her offspring. Someone whose dimples probably reminded Alex of somebody, which is the only reason she had a chance in the first place. Someone she would really love to punch in the face again, and again, and again, and again-

“…a nice person” Maggie managed to force out. “She… obviously has good taste…” Maggie continued, proud of her own restraint, “…I mean, anyone would be lucky to date Alex, so… if she’s at least smart enough to see that, then-”

“What?!” Ruby actually looked up at her. “My mom and Alex aren’t dating!”

“Oh.” Maggie leaned back against the couch, her arm nonchalantly draping over the back and being very casual about this, because this was neutral information she felt very neutral about and evoked no emotion at all. Nope. No emotion whatsoever. “They’re not?” she asked super casually, because she didn’t really care at all, and also did she mention she felt very neutral about this?

“No,” the girl said softly, turning sad again, “no girlfriends around here…”

Maggie deflated slightly, as she was brought down from her soaring neutral-ness. “Look, Ruby… hardly anyone’s first lady crush ends up going well. And even if they do, they rarely last.” She gave the girl a knowing smile. “Was this girl your friend? Maybe your best friend?” Ruby kept looking at  the floor as she silently nodded. “Mhm…” Maggie nodded her wise old lesbian head in understanding, “…been there, kid. But listen, if she’s really your friend you two will work it out and you’ll even laugh about this someday!”

And here she was again, trying to make it ‘better’ for someone else, like she’d done with Alex. I mean, it’s not like she and Eliza Wilke ever spoke a word again after she’d left her that letter. Stupid little-

“I don’t think we’ll laugh about it,” Ruby muttered while fiddling with her fingers, “she said it was gross…”

Maggie sat up straighter, suddenly sharing Alex’s urge to throw that brat into solitary confinement. “She called you gross?!”

“No, no!!”

Ruby held out her hands, apparently still feeling the need to defend the girl, and Maggie felt a sting in her chest because holy shit, she was still defending her! Maggie blinked a few times, as her allergies started playing up. Yes. She had allergies. They were just allergies, okay?!

“It! She said it was gross! You know… the part… about her being my girlfriend…” Ruby sighed deeply as she looked at her shoes again, but Maggie frowned in confusion.

“Hold it, hold it, wait a second! You straight up asked her to be your girlfriend?!” Maggie’s eyes widened, as Ruby looked back up at her.

“Well… yes.”

“Damn…” Maggie shook her head incredulously, “…respect, girl. Like, seriously, most of us don’t even get to the ‘I like you’ part without tripping over the words. Hell, I had to write a letter, I was so nervous about it!”

“Yeah, well…” Ruby just shrugged, looking defeated, “…it didn’t really help, did it? Alex even warned me not to bring up the girlfriend part yet, but I didn’t listen.”

“Wait…” Maggie snorted loudly, “…Alex said that?”

“Well, yeah… she said I shouldn’t spring too much on her right away…”

Maggie couldn’t contain herself as she started cackling loudly, leaning back against the couch and slapping the cushions in delight. Oh, that was gold. She kept on laughing loudly while Ruby looked confused, but for the first time seemed to be cracking a small smile as well. “What’s so funny?”

“Oh… oh… it’s just…” Maggie wheezed out another burst of laughter before regaining a minimum of composure, “I’m sorry, but that is priceless! She has no right to talk, trust me!”

“What do you mean?” Ruby asked, smiling curiously.

“Do you want to know what she did to let me know that she liked me?” Maggie asked mischievously. Ruby nodded her head with a hint of excitement as she scooted closer on the couch. Maggie leaned closer and whispered in a conspiratorial tone. “She told me she came out to her sister… then we hugged… and then she grabbed my face and kissed me!”

Maggie snickered as she watched Ruby’s eyes widen with both awe and excitement, as she let out and incredulous laugh. “No way! And that… that actually worked?!”

Maggie barked out a surprised laugh. “Oh god no! I turned her down immediately. She never told you this?! I had to get shot before I realised I liked her back.” She chuckled as she thought back to those days. Good times…

“So…” Ruby suddenly turned serious again as she returned to fiddling with her fingers, “so maybe… people can still change their mind? I mean… maybe someday… Erika could like me back? Like what happened with you and Alex…”

Oh no, there was that helpless face again, and Maggie swallowed as she started blinking again. Goddamn allergies. “Oh sweetie, I… I wouldn’t count on it. These things, they… I mean in most cases…” Maggie was scrambling to finish that sentence, especially because Ruby looked like she would start crying again any second, but she was saved by the bell. Or by the Alex, in this case.

“Guys! I have to get to work, apparently they need me at the D- I mean, the FBI.”

Maggie got up, worriedly glancing Alex up and down. “Are you sure that’s safe, in your state and everything? Should I drive you?”

“No, it’s fine. They’re picking me up.” She hobbled towards the front door, before throwing a glance back at Ruby. “Are you going to be okay staying on your own for a while, Ruby? You know, in case Maggie has to-”

“No, no, it’s…” Maggie stammered for a moment as she looked between Ruby and Alex, “…I mean, I can stay if- if that’s- I mean-”

“I’m going to my room,” Ruby announced, suddenly darting away, but not before Maggie spotted the girl struggling with her own allergies. Must be something in this house…

“Look,” Alex let out a frustrated sigh, “if you don’t want to stay, I understand, but-”

“Wait…” Maggie suddenly frowned in confusion as she looked back at Alex, “…couldn’t you have called the DEO to come and pick you two up in the first place? Why did you have to call me?”

Alex blanched. “I- I- I just- I mean- we- that is…” she silently opened and closed her mouth a few times, “…I have to go.” Before Maggie could get another word in, she’d suddenly darted outside at an alarming speed for someone on crutches, as the door fell closed behind her.

Oh, no…

No, no, no, this was bad. This was really, really bad. Because she already had trouble mentally referring to Alex as her ex anything, but now she’d had to go and bring all those memories up again to Ruby. And Alex hadn’t helped either just now, giving her that same deer-in-headlights look that she’d had when Maggie first called her out for liking her. And speaking of Ruby, WHAT THE HELL WAS UP WITH THAT?! Why was she so adorable?! Weren’t kids supposed to be all, like, clingy and with jammy hands and screaming for another cookie?! Why was looking at Ruby like looking at a tiny twelve-year-old mirror?! When did kids become cute?! Why did she feel like hugging a kid?! To summarise, WHAT THE HELL?!

Maggie scrunched her eyes closed as she face-planted on the couch, before letting out a long groan into the pillows. Unbelievable. She was going to have to win her bae back, wasn’t she?

Ex!! Ex-bae!!

For now…

Chapter Text

Sam winced at a distant sound.

She groaned as she clasped her bedsheets, because despite being monumentally tired something had apparently managed to wake her up. After coming back from wherever she’d been to (clearly not a meeting at FritzTech, where she hadn’t shown up), and after confessing to Alex that she had blanks in her memories, she’d finally made it home. She’d been too exhausted to even turn on the lights. She’d just poked her head into Ruby’s room, checking she was there, before plodding to her own bed with eyes already half-closed and barely managing to wriggle out of her clothes before collapsing into deep sleep.

Until waking up for some reason just now.

She scrunched her eyes tighter, now suddenly recognising the distant sound as a knocking on her front door. She forced one eyelid open, facing an alarm clock that spelled 3:30 AM before groaning and slowly lifting her head, which felt like it was filled with bricks. She had the good sense to throw on a T-shirt before yawning all the way to the front door, feeling like the sound of the rain ticking on the windows might make her plunge back into sleep at any moment.

The sight on the other side of the door, however, woke her up a little: A young girl, probably Ruby’s age, completely drenched from the rain and with a very sad face. Sam blinked a few times to make sure she wasn’t still sleeping. “Um… can I help you?”

“Is… is… is Ruby home?” the girl asked, quivering lip and all.

“It’s 3 in the morning, of course she’s home. Why aren’t you?” Sam blinked again, her confusion overpowering her drowsiness.

“I… I just… I really need to talk to Ruby…”

“Hang on, get out of the rain first.” She stepped to the side, ushering the girl into the house and banishing the cold air by closing the door. “Look… Ruby’s sleeping right now, and she has school tomorrow. Do your parents know where you are?” Sam rubbed her eyes, trying to will her sleep and confusion away, while the girl in front of her hugged herself and kept shivering from the cold. She could’ve sworn she’d seen her before. “I’m sorry, do I know you?”

“Um... I’m… Erika. Erika Morrison?”

Sam frowned as she forced her tired brain to retrieve the information she knew was supposed to be there. “Erika… as in Ruby’s best friend, Erika?”

The girl just nodded in response and Sam was trying to figure out whether this situation was as bizarre as it seemed or if her sleepy mind was playing tricks on her. Before she could figure it out, however, she was suddenly startled by a sound that resembled the groan of a wild bear. Her eyes shot wide open at the sight of a wild mane emerging from her couch. Sam screeched in utter panic. “AAAAHH!!”

She had the good sense to grab Erika and shield her from whatever wild animal was sitting on her couch as she blindly reached for a knife on the kitchen counter behind her.

“What time is it?”

Sam suddenly doubted if she’d ever woken up, as the wild animal on her couch appeared to have spoken. Animals didn’t speak. Right?

“Why is it so dark?”

The animal moved from its spot and found the light switch, flicking it on. Oh… so not an animal, then. The formerly supposed animal was actually a small woman, with a severe case of bed hair, who yawned loudly before spotting the clock on the wall.

“Damn… I must have fallen asleep.” She turned her head to the side and finally noticed Sam and Erika standing petrified in the kitchen, the former still with a kitchen utensil stretched out in her hand to defend herself from an animal kingdom intrusion. The small woman frowned as she turned towards them. “You’re Ruby’s mom, right?”

Sam squinted her eyes, as the strange woman stepped closer. “Ma- Maggie Sawyer?!!”

“That’s me.”

Sam blinked at the woman who had been asleep on her couch. The woman she’d met exactly once before. About two months ago. “Wha- what are you doing here?”

“Oh, Alex asked me to keep an eye on Ruby. I guess I was more tired than I thought.” She laughed briefly, before looking the woman over. “Don’t worry. I don’t bite, so you can put the spatula down now.”

Sam blinked and looked down at her outstretched hand before flushing red, because a spatula was indeed the weapon she was holding. As she sheepishly put it away, however, Maggie’s attention seemed to fall on the girl who had been standing behind her.

“You,” Maggie said thoughtfully, pointing at the girl, “you’re Erika Morrison.” It wasn’t a question and the girl swallowed, looking nervously between the two women, while Sam was just thoroughly confused. This could all still be a dream, right? Because this sure seemed highly improbable. “You and I need to have a chat. Sit down,” she commanded, patting the table as she plopped down onto a chair. The drenched girl, maybe intimidated by the commanding tone did just that, but Sam felt the need to be reasonable. Just in case she was actually awake right now.

“No, no, nobody is talking about anything at this hour at night. Erika needs to go home, I really need to go to bed and you-”

“Relax, Alias, this won’t take long.”

“It’s Arias.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Maggie waved her hand at her, not even bothering to look away from the girl seated across the table, and Sam was starting to feel highly offended at being dismissed in her own house. By a relative stranger. At 3:30 in the morning. Maybe she was still dreaming after all…

“So you think it’s cool to call your friends gross?” Maggie suddenly questioned of the drenched girl, her tone not so friendly.

“I- I- I didn’t… I didn’t mean her personally…”

“How exactly is she supposed to not take that personally?” Maggie interrupted, still with the air of someone who’s interrogating a suspect in a murder case.

The girl swallowed nervously, still shivering from the cold as she hugged her arms around her. “I came to apologise, didn’t I?” she muttered quietly, while looking down at her shoes.

“Well, that’s a start,” Maggie said coolly.

Sam frowned as she looked between the two people seated at her table. “What exactly is going-”

“Not now, Airbus.” Maggie waved her hand again, still not looking away from Erika. Sam was starting to get more and more offended, not only at Maggie completely ignoring her, but also about her apparent insistence on treating Erika like a criminal just for some silly argument between kids. If it was all that serious Ruby would have surely told her about it, right?

“What you need to understand, Erika, is that this might be a difficult time for Ruby” Maggie started seriously. “She’s going to need all the support she can get, and I understand that it might be awkward between you two for a while. But if you’re really her friend then you’ll get over it and you’re certainly not going to start calling her names again because, trust me, there’s gonna be plenty of other people ready to do that.”

Erika just nodded as she kept looking at her shoes, still hugging herself and her bottom lip trembling faster by the second. “I… I was- I was just scared…” she muttered.

Sam was starting to get worried about the girl, who looked like she was on the verge of bursting into tears, but for some reason Maggie saw fit to throw her hands up in exasperation. “Scared?!! Seriously?!! Of what?!! You know she speaks English, right?!! If you’d just said ‘no thank you, not interested’ she would’ve gotten the message!!”

“N- no… that- that’s not-” Erika struggled to protest between her hiccups.

“What is your problem?!” Sam hissed. “Can’t you see you’re making her upset?! What on earth-”

“Stay out of it, Hets-R-Us!”

“It’s Arias!!”

Maggie didn’t even dignify her with a sideways glance, continuing to stare a hole through the shivering girl. “So what should you be scared of, then?! Huh?!” Maggie kept giving the girl an insisting look, while Erika appeared at a loss for words at this point. The girl seemed like she was about to say something but then decided against it, resuming her staring contest with the floor. “I promise you that Ruby telling you how she felt took a lot more courage than you standing there and insulting her!! So let’s hear it, what was so scary?! Why would you-”

The detective suddenly fell silent and looked like she’d just had an epiphany. “Oh, shit…” She kept staring at the girl who carefully looked up, the detective now seeming incredulous more than anything as some sort of understanding seemed to be dawning on her. “Shit… you were scared because… you feel the same way, don’t you?”

Sam frowned at the conversation that made no sense to her, as Erika didn’t respond but instead seemed to struggle even harder to hold back her tears, her face contorting in the process.

“And then… you went off on her because…”

“Because I don’t want to be gay!!” The girl finally broke down and started crying, while Maggie finally gave her a sympathetic look.

Okay, yeah, this all made sense now. She’d had her suspicions but this definitely proved it; she was totally dreaming right now. Sam chuckled to herself, because she should’ve seen it earlier to be honest. Alex’s ex being asleep on her couch, Erika Morrison knocking on her door at 3 in the morning, of course this stuff wouldn’t happen in real life. She did wonder why her subconscious was shipping her daughter with her best friend, though. She gently started slapping her own cheek. “Wake up, wake up…”

Maggie momentarily looked at her like she’d lost her mind, before turning back to Erika. “Look, you… you know that-”

“You know it’s not a bad thing, right?”

Three heads turned to the side, to see Ruby standing on the threshold of the room, clad in bright blue pyjamas and sporting a
Kara Danvers-level, puppy-eyed look directed at Erika.

“You know that being gay is not a bad thing, right?”

“Go back to bed, honey, mommy’s just having a really weird dream.”

Ruby frowned as she caught sight of her mother’s weird smile and her apparent need to keep slapping her own cheek. “What… what’s wrong with her?” she asked warily.

Maggie cleared her throat. “I think we just fried her brain a little. Look…” she paused, curiously glancing between the two girls before letting out a sigh, “…okay, here’s what we’re gonna do. You two talk. Me and your mom are gonna wait outside and when you’re done I’ll drive Erika home, alright?” She received two timid nods in response. “Oh! Rules;” she turned back around before reaching Sam, “Ruby, don’t be pushy. Erika, no name calling.” She waited to receive another pair of nods, before guiding Sam to the front door. “Come on, Icarus, let’s give them some space.”

“Wake up, wake up…”

Maggie basically dragged the woman out the front door while Sam kept trying to slap herself awake. When the door closed behind them, the silence was suddenly very oppressing, the only sound being the heavy raindrops ticking against the window, creating a surreal atmosphere between the hopeful girl in the blue pyjamas and the teary-eyed girl who was drenched from the rain.

Ruby nervously took a seat right next to Erika. “So you… you don’t think I’m gross?”

“It!” Erika shivered, seemingly surprised by her own outburst. “I never… I never said… I said it was gross…” she mumbled.

“But… you don’t really think it  is gross either?”

Erika looked at her, looking so very scared and so very small -which was new, because she was quite a bit taller than her- and Ruby wanted desperately to hold her hand, but Maggie had said not to be pushy. And maybe grabbing her hand was pushy, right?

“I just… I always tried not to think about it…” Erika swallowed, still seeming scared but at least she was looking at her, “I thought I was imagining things and that it would pass, but… but then… you said all that and… I got really scared…”

“Why?” Ruby frowned at her, feeling genuinely confused. “Why are you scared?”

“Why are you not scared?” Erika asked, seeming equally confused. “If we, like… you know… kiss…” Ruby instantly got goose bumps at that mental image, “then… it… it would mean… I mean, we would be…” she hesitated, looking around as if someone might hear them, “…gay.” She finished with a whisper. She let out a shaky breath. “I mean, that… that’s really scary.”

“Why would that be scary? Being gay is super cool!”

Erika frowned, completely taken off guard by that response. “It… it is?”

“Yeah! You met Maggie just now, right?” Erika nodded, still seeming confused. “Well, she’s gay and she’s a police detective. She, like, solves murders and stuff. I mean, that’s cool, right?! And her ex-girlfriend is called Alex and she works for the FBI and she even does stuff together with Supergirl! She told me about this one time when Supergirl caught her after she jumped out of a building! And lots of other times they did cool things together!”

Erika finally hugged herself a little less tighter, letting her hands slide down to her knees and clasping her jeans instead.

“Oh! And you know Lena Luthor, right?”

Erika blinked a few times. “Lena Luthor is gay?”

“Well… I’m not really sure,” Ruby confessed sheepishly. “But Alex has a sister, right? And she sometimes visits Lena for interviews and lunch, because she’s a reporter but they’re friends too. And… I don’t know, Lena always does stuff she doesn’t normally do when Kara’s there. Like… she says all these really sweet things to her, and she giggles, and smiles a lot, and turns really red sometimes,” Ruby shrugged, “so you know, it’s totally possible because… um…” Ruby hesitated, turning rather red herself, “that… that’s what I do around you, too… I think…”

Ruby looked up, finding Erika also slightly redder, and the smallest hint of a smile. Erika Morrison was smiling because of her and Ruby really wanted to hold her hand right now and maybe kiss her too while she was at it, but Maggie had been very clear. Don’t be pushy, Ruby!

“But… some people don’t think so, right?” Erika asked while searching Ruby’s eyes, her smile fading again. “Some people don’t think it’s cool…”

“Some people are stupid.”

Erika’s hands seemed to relax, as she slowly unclenched her fists. “So… you’re really not worried? About kids at school knowing or… people being mean?”

Ruby shrugged. “Not really. I mean, kids can be mean for almost anything anyways. Like, if they think you’re too good at math. Obviously that one doesn’t affect me,” she chuckled sheepishly. “Or if they think your clothes are weird. Or if they think you’re not pretty enough. Obviously that one doesn’t affect you, but-” Ruby snapped her mouth closed, as perhaps the fact it was so late had cancelled out her filters. “I…” Ruby swallowed nervously, “I just said that out loud, didn’t I?”

She looked up, only to find Erika’s smile growing wider and she’d just made Erika smile twice in a row and she really didn’t care if she was being pushy anymore, because if she didn’t hold her hand right now she was just going to burst.

“So… you know… I won’t let anyone be mean to you. I promise.” While she said it, she carefully reached out and slid her fingers under Erika’s palm. And oh god, she could make all the speeches about not having to be scared she wanted, but the thought of Erika pulling her hand away right now was making her shake in her Supergirl slippers. Instead, as their hands clasped together, Erika gently squeezed back and Ruby was very proud of herself for not squealing.

“So if people are mean… you’ll punch them in the face?” Erika asked teasingly.

“That was one time!!”

Erika actually laughed at her, brightly and fondly, and Ruby did a mental fist pump because that was three in a row! She was on a roll tonight! She was also struggling to sit still, because Erika was still holding her hand and showing no signs of letting go, and Ruby decided that this was the perfect time to throw Maggie’s rules out the window.

“So I don’t know if you heard… but there’s going to be a carnival in Juniper Square this weekend.” Erika gave her a questioning look and Ruby had to call on her inner Supergirl to not chicken out. “I thought… maybe if you wanted, we could… you know… go together? Just you and me?”

Erika’s smile slowly faded, and it took everything Ruby had to not start panicking. The drenched girl looked away for a moment, seemingly thinking about it, and it looked like all her fears were suddenly flooding back to her mind. Ruby clasped the girl’s hand tighter, unintentionally more than anything, because Erika holding her hand was the greatest feeling in the world and the look on her face right now made her think that maybe she wouldn’t get to do that anymore. Erika seemed to notice, as her head turned back to look at their joined hands.

“Okay.”

Ruby took a moment to make sure she didn’t imagine that, as Erika lifted her head and finally made eye contact again. “Really? You want to go together?”

Erika’s smile made its glorious return (and not for nothing, but that was four in a row, or at least it would be if she was keeping count or whatever) as the girl nodded in response. “Yes. I’d like that.”

Ruby didn’t know what else to do, besides allowing her own uncontrollable smile to reach for her ears, so she did just that. Normally she would hold on to the golden Supergirl necklace that her mom had given her, if she was really happy or really sad. But she didn’t miss it right now, because looking at Erika Morrison while she was smiling like that was enough. Holding her hand was more than enough to remind her of the symbol’s meaning.

Stronger together

Meanwhile, outside on the porch Sam had stopped wondering if you were supposed to be this damn cold when you were dreaming. She shivered in nothing but her flimsy T-shirt, as she watched Maggie with intrigue. The detective had spent the past ten minutes craning her neck in uncomfortable positions to try and see what was going on inside the house. But now she had stopped, instead wiping at her face with her sleeve for some reason.

Sam frowned as she stepped closer. “Are… are you crying?”

“No, I… I have allergies… they’re just allergies…” she sniffed loudly, “…shut up.”

Chapter Text

“You’re… you’re dating?”

“Yep!”

Alex looked at her sister with wide eyes, as the alien woman was sitting on Sam’s couch with Lena Luthor in her lap. And no, that was not an exaggeration. Lena was literally sitting on Kara’s lap with her legs sticking out on the couch, while holding her arms around Kara’s neck and giving her a look that no elder sister should have to bear witness to.

“Apparently you’re not supposed to want to kiss your best friend senseless!” Kara proclaimed all excited, while Alex looked on in disbelief. “So, yeah! We’re girlfriends now.” Kara smiled at the woman sitting on her lap, and Alex wondered what she had done wrong in her past lives to deserve having to sit through that sight.

“It was about time,” Lena said in a husky voice, looking at Kara like she’d personally hung every last star in the sky, and Alex seriously nodded her head, deciding that in her last life she must have been a mass murderer.

“So… does that mean James is single now?”

All three women blinked in surprise as they turned their heads to give Sam an odd look. Even Lena tore her eyes away from Kara for a second. “Yes, I suppose so,” the CEO answered. “Why?”

“Oh, pfft, no reason,” Sam waved her hand dismissively. “Just, you know… asking. As a colleague. It’s not like I care, or anything. I mean I don’t not care, I’m not heartless, I just… feel neutral about it. I just like being informed about a- a fellow CFO. It’s just… information. Did I mention I feel very neutral about this?” She was met with Alex’s eyebrows raised to her hairline, while the two lovebirds on the couch had already forgotten that the rest of the world existed. “Well, I… I guess I’ll break out the champagne. For… for those two,” Sam declared while she gestured to her couch, before making her way out of her own living room and away from the two women who were giving each other mesmerising looks.

Alex twitched, as she realised she’d missed the opportunity to help Sam, and was thus not able to avoid sitting in front of Kara and Lena, who were shamelessly star-gazing into each other’s eyes. Alex was just considering the pros and cons of faking a heart attack, when she was saved by the bell. The front door one, that is.

“I’ll get it!!” Alex said quickly as she snatched her only remaining crutch, but the two lovebirds apparently had no interest in such mundane tasks as opening the front door. Or anything else that involved severing contact with each other, for that matter. A freshly traumatized Alex stumbled towards Sam’s front door, shaking her head in disbelief at her current predicament, but unfortunately for her it only got worse when she opened the door.

Maggie Sawyer was standing on the other side.

And Maggie felt like a complete idiot as she looked Alex over. Because her grand plan of winning her bae back, which was supposed to start right now with the wearing of those uncomfortable leather pants that she knew for a fact drove Alex nuts, was being derailed by the other woman’s attire. Because she was the one who was supposed to be disarming in this situation. She was the one supposed to be doing the seducing, but Alex was wearing that one red top. That one very unfair red top, that had to be at least a size too small and man, this was so unfair!

“M- Maggie,” Alex stammered, suddenly sounding as if she hadn’t had a glass of water in three days, as her eyes drifted over those unfair leather pants, “what are you doing here?”

“What are you talking about, Danvers?” Maggie responded, miraculously managing not to drool as she sounded borderline asthmatic. “Without me this wouldn’t even be happening. I couldn’t miss seeing the grand finale.” Alex just hummed in response as they both just stood there for a second. Alex staring at Maggie’s legs and Maggie staring at Alex’s… upper body region. “So… are you gonna let me in?”

Alex snapped out of her daze. “Right. Yes… come- come in.” She moved to the side and Maggie stepped past her and oooooh, come on, there was no need to get that close!

Maggie did a mental victory lap as she noticed Alex shiver when she brushed past her. One point for Sawyer! Maggie’s victorious smirk quickly faded, however, when she entered the living room. She had to do a double take, because there was no way that Lena Luthor was sitting on Kara’s lap, was there?

“Hey! Maggie!” Kara chirped. “Did you hear the good news?!” Maggie just frowned in confusion while Kara, in her enthusiasm, completely missed her sister silently signalling her to shut it. “Lena and I are girlfriends now!” She returned to giving the woman in her lap a completely enamoured puppy-eyed look, while Alex groaned in defeat and Maggie snickered as she turned around to face the older Danvers sister.

“Well, look at that, Danvers,” she drawled. “Looks like you gotta pay up.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Alex grumbled, pulling a twenty from her pocket and shoving it in the detective’s outstretched hand.

“What’s going on?” Kara asked confused.

“Don’t worry about it, little Danvers,” the detective snickered as she sunk down in the chair Alex had just been sitting in as she exaggeratedly waved her twenty bucks around.

Alex stepped closer, her arms still crossed and maybe still moping a little about losing what was supposed to be a sure-fire bet. But seriously, who could have predicted Kara and Lena being all head over heels for each other?! Maggie had to be psychic or something!

“That’s my chair,” Alex grumbled.

“There’s plenty of room on the couch,” Maggie quipped as she put her money away.

“I’m not going near that!” Alex exclaimed, looking over at the two girlfriends tangled together who had started shamelessly playing with each other’s hair and were apparently unaware of the slightly nauseous DEO agent shaking her head at them.

“Well… you can try to fit in here.” Maggie motioned at the chair she was occupying, which was definitely large, but was in no way designed for two people. Alex stepped closer, squinting her eyes at the detective and receiving a stubbornly challenging look in return. Alex’s right eye twitched a little, but she wasn’t going to back down from a challenge; she was a certified badass DEO agent after all! She wouldn’t flinch. No matter how unfair those pants were…

Alex and Maggie kept their eyes locked, neither of them willing to give round, as Alex very slowly put down her crutch and leaned with her hand on the back of the chair. She very carefully manoeuvred her way into the chair, ending up squished against her ex-girlfriend and struggling to think about anything that wasn’t those leather pants pressing against her good leg. Apparently Maggie was having a hard time too, because she could feel her shiver when their sides got pressed together. One point for Danvers!

“So, Kara,” the detective started in an unusually high-pitched voice, “how’s the Super stuff going?”

“Fine, fine,” Kara muttered, not even bothering to look away from her girlfriend. “Same old, same old.”

“Uh, no it’s not,” Alex interjected, because this was probably the one topic that was able to distract her from her compromising position. She kept glaring at her sister, who seemed to struggle to tear her eyes away as she blinked in confusion. “You were completely reckless on that blue star. Someone could’ve died.”

“Pfft, that’s crazy.” Kara protested. “Why would anyone die?”

“What?” Maggie asked confused. “What happened?”

“This one,” Alex explained, gesturing at the enamoured blue-eyed mess on the couch, “went to a space station near a blue star where she had no powers, barged right in there, knocked out three people, slung a priestess over her shoulder and carried her back to the ship, declaring that ‘she was in a hurry’. We even sent Psi and Livewire with her for back-up and she didn’t even give them a chance to help!” Alex kept giving her sister an accusatory look, while the alien woman sheepishly shrugged back.

“I just… had something I needed to finish…” she turned her head back to Lena, and Alex blanched, because that was definitely a non-PG look she was giving the youngest Luthor. But before she had a chance to express her horror, Sam returned with a champagne bottle in hand.

“So I hope you guys like the newer stuff, I don’t…” she trailed off as she frowned at the two women pressed together in the chair. “What are you doing here?” she asked the smaller woman.

“Witnessing the fruits of my labour, obviously,” Maggie proclaimed. “Honestly, Morpheus, the only reason this is happening right now, is because of my awesome intervention.”

Sam gritted her teeth. “It’s Arias,” she hissed, but she quickly deflated at the thought of why they were all there. “I still can’t believe Ruby is actually on her first date,” she sighed. “I mean… she’s not too young, is she? I’m not a bad mom for letting her go unsupervised, right?”

“Relax, Pancreas,” Maggie reassured her. “They’re not unsupervised. I’m having McConnell tail them.”

Alex blinked in surprise as she looked back at her ex. “I thought McConnell was an asshole?”

“Oh, he is,” Maggie grinned. “But he owed me a favour, so now we get to rest easy about Ruby, and I get to ruin his weekend. It’s a win-win.” Maggie looked entirely too satisfied with herself, but Alex huffed out a breath.

“Hm… and here I thought you hated kids,” she mumbled.

Maggie swallowed, and it took her a moment to respond. “Well, maybe… maybe they’re not so bad…”

Everyone in the room froze, all eyes suddenly on Maggie, as even Kara and Lena broke their love-struck staring contest to gape at the detective. Alex’s face completely dropped as she looked at the woman who was pressed up against her in the way too small chair. “You…” she swallowed, incredulously searching Maggie’s face, “you mean that… that you… might…”

“They’re back!”

They all flinched at Sam’s exclamation, but the next second they were all scrambling to their feet, as they gathered by the window to see Ruby and Erika approaching the porch. Some noses may have ended up pressed against the glass.

“I thought the Ferris wheel would be scarier,” Erika laughed, as they stepped onto the porch of Ruby’s house. “They always look like they go waaay up high, but it wasn’t too bad.”

“I seriously can’t believe you’ve never been on a Ferris wheel before,” Ruby smiled while shaking her head. “But hey, we can always find another if this one was disappointing.”

“No!” Erika suddenly stepped closer and looked a lot more serious than before. “I didn’t mean…” she looked unsure of herself as she stammered for a moment. “I’m not disappointed… it was great. All of it… it was all great,” she nervously smiled, and Ruby just grinned back, because she would honestly never get tired of Erika Morrison’s smile. “Although you really should’ve tried the cotton candy.”

“I did try it!” Ruby protested. “But it was all weird and sticky and… blegh.” Ruby tried to pull a disgusted face to help make her point, but that was impossible, since Erika was still smiling at her. And it was physically impossible to look disgusted in front of Erika Morrison’s smile. If that wasn’t already a law of physics, then she could talk to Lena later and make sure that it got written down. “But, yeah…” Ruby giggled, “I thought everything was great too.” They just stood there for a moment, both of them wearing matching grins, but then Ruby swallowed as she started speaking again. “And I was thinking, that… maybe-” she suddenly stopped herself as she looked past Erika. “I’m- I’m sorry…” she stammered, stepping past her, “…just a second…” she proceeded to step up to the window where she had spotted the women with their faces squished against the other side, before banging her hand against the glass with an offended look. There were a set of surprised gasps and squeaks, as the peeping Janes disappeared from view, and the distinct sound of five people falling all over each other could be heard.

Ruby nervously cleared her throat as she turned back around and stepped back to Erika. “Sorry,” she chuckled self-consciously. “They’re all a little… too enthusiastic about this.” She scratched her neck, not sure how to explain their exaggerated interest, but Erika’s smile suddenly turned sad.

“It’s okay,” she mumbled. “I wish… I mean… I’m not sure my parents will be so happy…” she fiddled with her sleeve as her eyes turned away, and Ruby stepped up to her.

“You didn’t tell them? About… the date thing?” Ruby felt her face turn a little red, because she was pretty sure this was the first time either of them had actually called it a date.

“No… I mean, I told them where I was going… but… I don’t think they understood it was… a date…” she kept fiddling nervously, while Ruby had to contain herself from squealing. Because Erika had just called it a date too! But she forcibly controlled herself, as she searched for Erika’s eyes to give her a reassuring look.

“It’s okay,” she started carefully. “You don’t have to tell them if you’re not ready.” Ruby smiled at her, as the taller girl finally looked back up. “Alex says it’s normal to be scared about-”

“No.” Ruby was stunned into silence as Erika suddenly looked more determined. “I’m not scared,” she declared boldly. A beat of silence passed. “Not anymore,” she insisted. And Ruby didn’t know what to say, because she wasn’t sure why Erika was looking at her like that. She hoped she hadn’t offended her. “O… Okay,” Ruby stammered. “I didn’t mean… I wasn’t-”

Whatever she was about to say was forever forgotten, because Erika suddenly took a step forward, grabbed her face, leaned down and kissed her. This time, there was no way in hell that Ruby could’ve contained her surprised squeal even if she’d wanted to, but the taller girl pulled back almost as quick as she’d darted in. Ruby just stood there; heart pounding, cheeks flaming, and just as she thought that life couldn’t get any better, Erika sealed it all by smiling at her.

Ruby could only stare at the wondrous sight, but then all of a sudden the taller girl took off. She skidded quickly down the steps of the porch, and only when she was halfway down the street did she shoot another one of her gorgeous smiles back at Ruby. Ruby, who was still frozen in place in the middle of her front porch. As she watched Erika Morrison run off with an uncontrollable smile on her face.

She wasn’t exactly sure how long it took to get her feet to move. But when she did, she stepped into the house, and into the hallway from where she could see the five people in the living room trying to act casual. “Heeeeey, honey,” Sam drawled. “So… um… did- did you have fun?”

Ruby just nodded, before testing if her vocal chords still remembered how to function. “Yeah,” she breathed out, and waddaya know, they still worked, “it was great. It was all great.” She smiled nervously, before turning towards the stairs, but Maggie’s voice suddenly stopped her.

“Whoa, whoa, that’s it?! Come on, kid, we need details!” the detective exclaimed. Sam gave the woman a less than pleased look, but she didn’t protest as she turned back to curiously gaze at her daughter.

“Just… um… another time,” Ruby stammered, her cheeks heating up again. “I’ll tell you another time…” she smiled nervously as she stepped towards the stairs. There was a soft murmur coming from the living room, only disrupted by Maggie’s loud groan of disappointment, but Ruby stopped with one hand on the railing. Because she felt like her happiness was about to seep out through her pores soon anyway, so what the hell. She cleared her throat as she stepped back to the threshold of the living room, causing the chatting people to look at her again.

“Yes, honey?” Sam questioned.

“Um…” Ruby looked at her feet for a moment as she shuffled them around, but then she looked back up and try as she might, she couldn’t fight off the huge grin that was spreading on her face. “We kissed. It was great.” She huffed out a shy laugh, before darting up the stairs as she practically ran into her room.

The reaction was delayed a few seconds, as five gaping mouths and wide eyes were left staring at an empty doorway. But then the cheering erupted, as the living room seemingly devolved into a high school courtyard. Lena and Maggie high-fived, Alex was laughing incredulously, Kara congratulated Sam extensively then questioned whether it was weird that she was congratulating her, and all the while Maggie loudly proclaimed to anyone who would listen that this was all thanks to her. Sam revelled in all the happiness. But she couldn’t help but feel that she wanted to be a part of it, so she approached Lena once more.

“So about James…”

“Zip it, Fart Ass!” Maggie exclaimed with glee. “Don’t ruin the gayness!”

“IT’S ARIAS!!”

Meanwhile, Ruby was in her room, barely aware of all the ruckus going on downstairs. She just stood pressed against her door for a minute while grinning like an idiot. Then she plopped down on her bed, grabbed a pillow, and squealed her happiness into it.

Ruby didn’t know it, but fifteen minutes later, about four miles south-east from there…

…Erika did the exact same thing.