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Alex’s 16 th birthday was the first morning in months that she didn’t get up early to go out and surf. Sure, she was up even earlier than usual, but it wasn’t because of the inner peace she got while crashing through the waves that always made her ready to face another challenging day. No, today she was up at 4 am on a Saturday, feeling giddy and excited because in a few minutes she would get her mark, because at exactly 4:08 am on the 16 th of April in 1989 she had come into this world which meant that in 2 minutes, her soulmate mark would appear.
“Kara”, she whispered into the silence of the room.
Her little sister stirred and mumbled: “Is it time yet?”
“In a minute”, Alex replied, unable to contain the excitement she felt. Kara shot up, never having been one to have trouble getting up in the morning and positively flew over to sit next to her big sister.
“Do you feel anything yet?”, Kara asked, trying to keep her voice down but evidently being nearly as nervous as Alex felt. Alex just shook her head.
“Where do you think it will be?”, Kara kept on asking, Alex only shrugged. She felt a bit sick now, as if she had been waiting for exactly that moment her whole life.
Then suddenly she gasped: She felt warmth spreading from her left inner forearm. She hurried to push up her sleeve while Kara flicked on the lamp on the bedside table. Both girls watched in amazement as black ink began to appear on Alex’s skin, beginning to write what soon became an M followed by an S. The writing was slightly scrawly but to Alex it looked beautiful all the same.
“Do you know anyone with those initials?”, Kara wanted to know after they had both just stared onto the mark for a moment. Alex wracked her brains, but she couldn’t think of anyone and shook her head. It wasn’t unusual. In fact, it was more unusual meeting your soulmate at a young age, so she wasn’t too worried about that.
“Do you think they’re 16 yet? Will you try and write to them?”, Kara said, as bubbly as ever when she was thrilled.
“I dunno, you think I should try?”, Alex asked, suddenly feeling even more nervous about the idea to write something onto her own skin to hope that her soulmate would be old enough to receive it on their own.
Kara nodded enthusiastically and scurried up to fetch a pen for Alex, handing it to her and looking up at her sister expectantly.
“What should I write?”, Alex whispered nearly inaudibly, unable to decide what would be an appropriate first approach if her soulmate was indeed old enough to see what she wrote to them.
Kara pulled a thinking face for a moment, a crease appearing between her eyebrows that she had somehow picked up from Alex, making them look a lot like sisters by birth sometimes.
“Maybe try with a simple hi?”, Kara finally concluded. “Or what would you like to say to them if you first meet them?”
Alex thought about that for a moment. She could be very expressive with her words when it concerned her homework or written papers but when it came to actual contact with people she sometimes stumbled over her words, especially with girls. She had no problem telling boys off for annoying her or making fun of Kara, but when it came to her normal friends – which were mostly girls – sometimes she could be a bit well… awkward. At least she hadn’t fallen in love with a boy yet because that could only mean disaster when it came to expressing herself. So maybe a simple ‘hi’ wouldn’t be so wrong? In any case, if he was her soulmate he should like her anyway.
Alex breathed deeply for a second before putting the pen to her left forearm right next to the mark and carefully wrote down ‘Hi’.
Maggie woke up with a gasp, feeling disoriented for a moment before realizing that the warmth on her left forearm must have woken her up. She tucked at her sleeve, turning on the small light next to her bed to see a simple ‘Hi’ written onto her arm. The writing looked clean, without unnecessary swirls. Unable to stop it, Maggie felt her heart miss a beat. So it was her soulmate’s birthday today, they had just turned 16 which meant that they were only around a year younger than she was herself.
She actually debated on getting up to get a pen and write back, but then all the reasons for not letting anyone in came crushing back into her mind. Her own parents didn’t even love her enough to want to have her around, to be able to at least tolerate her. How was she supposed to demand that from some person she had never actually met? No, if the whole Eliza drama had been any indication, her soulmate was much better off without her. Maggie pulled down her sleeve angrily, putting off the light and lay back down to get some more sleep. She tossed and turned for the next two hours, huffing each time and growing increasingly annoyed before finally getting up to make breakfast for herself and her aunt.
“Maybe they’re still asleep”, Kara debated, sitting next to her sister on the sofa in the living room. As they had both been unable to go back to sleep, they had decided on getting up to make hot cocoa.
“Or he’s not old enough yet”, Alex added, still staring down at her forearm.
“Have you felt anything yet?”, Kara asked, taking a sip from her mug.
“You mean if he’s resonated any feelings?”, Alex clarified, still not ripping her eyes away from the initials on her skin. Kara only nodded, looking at her sister expectantly.
“Uhm, I think I felt something around three years ago”, Alex replied in a small voice. She had never told anyone about the few very torturous weeks where her soulmate had resonated nothing but despair, fear and self-hatred which had left Alex feeling very worried and down herself.
“You never told me about that”, Kara exclaimed like Alex had expected she would. “What did you feel? How was it like?”
“Well, it wasn’t something good”, Alex said lamely. “He was pretty down for a few weeks.” Understatement of the century.
“And since then?”, Kara pressed on, evidently very interested in everything related to Alex’s soulmate.
“I think he broke his arm once”, Alex stated, leaving out that this was not even a week after the beginning of her soulmate’s desperation and it had been paired with a lot of anger and fear.
“Did they… uhm…”, Kara stammered suddenly, looking around the room as if to check that nobody else could hear them which was laughable because their parents were still fast asleep.
“Did they already you know… have sex?”, she finally whispered which made Alex laugh for the first time that day.
“I don’t think so”, she replied, shaking her head slightly. Sure, she had felt him being turned on a few times, especially in the evenings, but if he was a teenage boy that was pretty normal, right? Alex had really gotten to see too many boners at school during the last year. She shook her head, trying to get these disgusting images out of her system.
They were silent for a bit, both looking down on Alex’s arm and waiting if her soulmate would write back.
“Morning girls”, Eliza’s voice startled them out of their concentration. “Happy birthday, Alex”, she added, crouching down next to her eldest daughter and pulling her into a hug.
“Thanks”, Alex mumbled into her mother’s shoulder. When they had pulled apart, Alex lifted up her arm to show it to her without comment.
“And? Do you think you know them?”, Eliza asked her with a warm smile placed on her face that Alex rarely got to see these days.
“No, I don’t think I know him yet”, Alex replied, looking up at her mother as if wondering if she might.
“How do you know it’s a boy?”, her mother challenged, that smile still on her face.
“Wouldn’t I know if he wasn’t?”, Alex shot back, anger bubbling up. Why did her mother always question her judgement?
“I don’t think so”, Eliza said calmly. “I think you’ll know for sure when you meet them.”
Eliza had made sure that everyone in her household talked about soulmates with they/them pronouns until it was abundantly clear who it would be. She had explained it to Kara when she had first asked about soulmates, having heard about them in school. After the whole ordeal with Vicky, Eliza had been very glad about that because she was almost sure that at least Alex wasn’t straight. But she wouldn’t push her daughter on it and instead prepared Alex’s favorite breakfast: blueberry pancakes.
Alex’s soulmate didn’t write back the whole day, but she didn’t give up that easily so she wrote ‘Hi’ onto her arm every single morning until the day that her father died.
That day, Maggie woke up shaking out of the desperation and grief she felt her soulmate resonate. Her first thought was that her soulmate had finally understood that she wouldn’t write back, but that wouldn’t provoke such a strong reaction, would it?
The grief and desperation didn’t vanish for weeks, only slightly fainting over months. At that point, Maggie was sure that her soulmate must have lost someone dear to her and just hoped that they had loved ones left that would take care of them. Maggie at least had her aunt, although she would leave her soon to go to college and finally get out of that shithole that was Blue Springs.
When Alex first realized that she had stopped to write to her soulmate, she was torn between anger that he hadn’t written and asked what was wrong and thinking that he maybe still hadn’t turned sixteen. Over the years, Alex came to think that her soulmate just didn’t care about her and stopped thinking about it mostly. The whole idea of the universe forcing two people together was a bit constricting anyway. She had enough on her hands: First with taking care of Kara, trying to live up to her mother’s expectations that had only grown when her dad had died, trying and failing to ace college until J’onn found her and she managed to get back on her feet. The training at the DEO was hard and she got injured several times which sometimes let her to feel bad for her poor soulmate that certainly got all the pain resonated and sometimes thinking that it was his own fault for not caring about her at all.
With Kara coming out as Supergirl her life had become even more stressful, so she didn’t dwell on the soulmate thing too much anymore anyway. Although she did sometimes wonder about the hell of a high sex drive her soulmate seemed to have which annoyed her to pieces when she was trying to fall asleep after an exhausting day and felt way too turned on to do so.
That had been the case the night before the president was attacked and Alex stalked onto the crime scene at the airport, feeling tired as hell and nearly growling when she found an annoying cop named Maggie Sawyer crouching down, investigating something that so clearly wasn’t her jurisdiction. That cop then had the guts to show up in the warehouse they stormed trying to find that lose alien, nearly shooting her in the process.
It was after that meeting that she had Winn pull up her files, looking over his shoulder when Kara joined them.
“What are you doing? Found a suspect?”, she asked, coming up to Winn’s other side. “Hey, isn’t that the cop from the airport?”
“Yup and she managed to bust Alex’s sweep of the warehouse”, Winn offered as an explanation.
“Hey, Alex, wait”, Kara suddenly deadpanned. “Did you see her soulmark by any chance?”
“Ugh, no, why would I?”, Alex replied, sounding slightly annoyed.
“Look at her initials”, Kara stated in a low voice, looking cautiously over towards her sister who just sighed heavily.
“You always say that whenever there’s anyone with M.S. anywhere”, Alex said sharply. “And this cop annoys the hell out of me and is a woman, so definitely not my soulmate.”
Kara didn’t push it and Alex stalked away, looking almost angry.
The first time Alex actually considered that Maggie might be her soulmate, was when she took her hand the night when they invaded the alien fight club. She felt warmth shoot through her body at the contact, leaving her utterly confused. It was then that she started to think about if she might be into women, too, only to find out after some brain wracking and lots of drinking that she probably had never been into men in the first place. That would certainly explain why she had never felt anything like she had heard from lots of other people and too many rom coms Kara had put on during sister nights.
It didn’t take Kara long to recognize that Alex was upset about something and when they finally didn’t have a rogue alien lose or a burning building nearly crumbling, Kara made sure to force another sister night on them. J’onn had helped with that by making them leave early and so Kara was picking up tacos and potstickers on her way to Alex’s apartment on a Thursday night.
Alex was already half way through a wine bottle when Kara arrived at her place which made Kara even more certain that something wasn’t right. She left Alex alone for a bit to see if she would start to talk on her own, but Kara didn’t have much hope for that. She knew that Alex was the most open with her out of anybody in her life but that didn’t mean that Alex was easy on opening up at all.
After two episodes on Netflix all of their food was gone and Kara stopped her sister from putting on a third, making her look over in confusion.
“What’s up?”, Alex asked, settling back down and evidently preparing herself for solving a problem for Kara. Kara only smiled and said: “That’s what I wanted to ask you.”
The famous Danvers crease appeared between Alex’s eyebrows.
She wanted to say that she was fine but couldn’t bring herself to do so, so she just sighed and hid her face in her hands, shaking her head.
“Alex, what’s wrong?”, Kara wanted to know again, her voice now seriously concerned. She had rarely seen her sister that upset and was next to her, laying an arm around her shoulders in milliseconds.
“I don’t think there’s actually something wrong”, Alex said into her hands. “Or maybe there is…”
Kara squeezed her sister’s shoulder consolingly, letting her know that she wasn’t going anywhere. This made Alex finally look up, though she ran her fingers through her hair, worrying her lip between her teeth.
“Is this… Is this about Maggie?”, Kara pressed on cautiously, wanting to help Alex start to talk. This earned her a nod.
“And before you start: I don’t know if she’s my soulmate”, Alex cut in, putting up a hand to stop Kara from talking. “I just… I don’t know, she made me think about things and… I think I… like her.”
Alex looked up at her sister as if totally lost and waiting for judgement. Kara just smiled and pulled her into a tight hug before Alex felt a sob escape her body. She was somehow so relieved to have finally told someone and that her sister seemed to be okay with it that she couldn’t hold back. She got control of her breathing quickly though, murmuring a ‘sorry’ into Kara’s shoulder before pulling back and wiping at her eyes.
“There’s nothing to apologize for, Alex”, Kara assured her, putting a hand on her sister’s thigh, wanting to keep up their physical connection to show her that everything was okay.
“I’m just… confused”, Alex stated lamely, unable to express exactly what she had been feeling these last few days. Confusion didn’t nearly cover it.
Maggie had noticed that her soulmate had been upset the past two weeks. Evidently, something had come up that had left them upset and unable to calm down, even to sleep. It was 3 am and Maggie was wide awake, not sure if because of everything her soulmate was resonating or because of the nasty breakup she herself had had two days ago. The things her ex had said just told her once more that her soulmate would be better off without her, but here she was, sitting up in bed, pen in hand and hovering over her arm. It had occurred to her about an hour ago that Alex Danvers owned exactly the initials that were scribbled onto Maggie’s left forearm. Alex Danvers who had become something like a friend, a person she didn’t want to imagine her life without anymore. But if Alex really was her soulmate, that was just one more reason to not drown her in everything that was the mess named Maggie Sawyer. But she had to know, so she set down the pen on her skin and wrote back the simple ‘ Hi’ that was now overdue for years and waited.
Alex was tossing around so much in her bed that it took her a moment to realize the warmth that spread on her left forearm. She lit her lamp and sat up, blinking to accustom her eyes to the light before she looked down on her arm, unable to contain the small gasp leaving her lips when she saw the ‘ Hi’ written there. Her heart, that had stopped beating for a second a moment ago, was now racing in her chest and Alex scrambled to look for a pen in her bag that she had thrown down somewhere at the foot of the bed. When she had finally found one, she sat back and hesitated slightly before writing back ‘ hey’ .
Maggie couldn’t help but smile when she discovered the once so familiar hand writing on her forearm. Her own ‘ Hi’ had vanished the moment her soulmate had written back to her. Maggie’s smile faltered however when she remembered why she had written them in the first place. Sighing, she wrote down: Are you Alex Danvers?
It took Alex a moment to take in the words. So, her soulmate had figured out her name. Was it possible that it was indeed Maggie? She quickly scrawled back: Yes . And then, feeling bold, added: Are you Maggie Sawyer?
Maggie’s heart ached when she closed her eyes, set down her pen and wrote: No.
Neither Alex nor Maggie had gotten any sleep that night, unable to distinguish between the anguish they felt themselves and the one their soulmate was resonating. Alex had written and asked at once ‘ Who are you? ’, but she had gotten no answer in return, not that night and not for the next few days. Oddly enough, Maggie seemed to be avoiding her. Her messages were short when Alex texted her, their phone calls only ever strictly business which left Alex wondering if Maggie wasn’t her soulmate after all but simply didn’t want her. Being Alex, she had sat down to research if things like that ever happened. As she hadn’t been too much into the whole soulmate thing herself, she had never been particularly interested in all the unusual soulmate stories that were sometimes featured in the media. She even considered calling her mother to ask about it, knowing that she had done research in the soulmate area and was most likely to know if it could happen that the universe was wrong and one of the soulmates just didn’t connect with their match.
At this point Alex was certain that she had feelings for Maggie that outran anything she had ever felt for anyone by light years. She tried to uphold her façade to the outside world while feeling devastated on the inside. Her research had brought no story to light about two soulmates that were meant to be together not actually wanting one another once they had met. There were cases of people without soulmates or even cases of people with several soulmates, but nothing like what Alex was looking for. In her more alcohol induced states she was asking herself if she was just in love with the wrong person and her soulmate was still out there somewhere. One very drunk night she even used the DEO’s resources to search through databases to find someone with the initials M.S. that could be somehow connected to her or know her or even just have heard about her. Although she did come up with several names and used camera shots to make out their soulmarks, nobody came up that made sense. Nobody made sense but Maggie.
Kara had now grown into the habit of dropping by Alex’s apartment every night, often even sleeping at her place to make sure that her sister didn’t drink herself into stupor and trying to convince her to just talk to Maggie. She hadn’t told Alex yet that she had xray visioned Maggie and found out that she had indeed the initials A.D. on her left forearm because she wasn’t sure what Alex would even do with that knowledge. If it was true why would Maggie have lied to Alex?
Alex and Maggie hadn’t seen each other out of their professional interactions for several weeks now and Alex had given up to text her or even call to ask for a drink together.
Alex grew increasingly annoyed by her own depressed state and even more than usual sleep deprived life that she wore her emotions much more on the outside than usual. It was perhaps that that finally made her pull Maggie into a side alley on a crime scene with a very dead slimy alien downtown.
“Show me your forearm”, Alex demanded without any warning, staring Maggie down.
“What the fuck, Danvers”, Maggie snarled back. “What’s your problem?”
Alex didn’t answer and just shoved Maggie’s sleeve up to reveal the initials A.D. on Maggie’s forearm. Not letting go of Maggie’s arm, she fished out a pen and wrote a question mark onto her own skin. Her eyes flashed up to Maggie’s the moment she could see the sign appear on Maggie’s forearm.
“Why?”, Alex simply asked, her voice sounding dead even to her own ears.
Maggie pulled her arm out of Alex’s grip forcefully, looking actually angry before her whole body seemed to shrink and she whispered: “You don’t want me, Alex.”
Then she turned and walked away, leaving Alex to shout after her: “But I do!”
Maggie didn’t stop.
That night, Alex didn’t return to her apartment, knowing full well that Kara would be waiting there for her. Instead she just drove aimlessly through the city and the desert on her bike, ignoring all the worried text messages and missed calls, her speed balancing on the border of actually being reckless.
When she finally stopped, she realized that she was in front of Maggie’s apartment building. Her whole body was vibrating slightly from being on her bike for hours when she pulled down her helmet, not even caring to properly key up her bike before she made her way up to Maggie’s door. She knocked several times but nobody answered. Eventually Alex just slid down Maggie’s door, sinking down onto the ground, feeling too emotionally and physically tired to care about anything anymore.
She only looked up again when she recognized two feet standing in front of her. It was Maggie looking down at her, her face tear streaked.
“Why do you keep trying?”, Maggie whispered in a broken voice. “Please just accept that I’m not good enough for you.”
It took Alex a moment to take in the words. So that was the problem. It wasn’t her. It wasn’t that she wasn’t good enough for Maggie. It was that Maggie thought she wasn’t good enough for Alex. Alex blinked before getting up, groaning slightly because her legs felt like she had sat there for hours. Maybe she had.
“Maggie”, she started, her own voice hoarse out of emotion. “You’re all I have ever wanted. You’re tough, a badass really. You’re smart and kind and funny and beautiful and you’re one of two people on this planet that I thought saw me and liked me for me.”
Maggie’s eyes darted between Alex’s now.
“I like you exactly for who you are and that’s why we can’t be together, Alex”, Maggie replied almost imperceptibly. “I ruin people and I would never forgive myself for ruining you.”
“Who the hell made you think like that?”, Alex shot back, now angry. “No one has the right to make you think you’re anything but special.”
Maggie had retreated slightly at Alex’s outburst, her eyes still darting between Alex’s. Alex could see doubt flicker over her face. She didn’t know if she doubted what Alex was saying or if her resolve to not let Alex in was crumbling. Alex acted on instinct and just pulled her into a hug. Maggie tensed up, her arms stiff next to her body, but Alex didn’t let go.
“What did they do to you?”, Alex whispered into Maggie’s ear, her hand now softly stroking Maggie’s back. And that was when Maggie crashed. She began sobbing into Alex’s shoulder, her arms finally shooting around her and gripping at Alex’s leather jacket desperately. Alex just held her, feeling Maggie sag more into the embrace by the minute until Alex had to actually hold her up. It was then that Alex fished for Maggie’s keys and somehow managed to open her door. She guided them both inside, closing the door with her right foot before scooping Maggie up into her arms and carrying her over to the sofa where she maneuvered them both down carefully.
Alex didn’t know for how long they sat there, Maggie laying half on top of her, her face still buried in Alex’s shoulder. Alex kept telling her that everything was alright, that she was here now, that nobody was going to hurt her anymore and everything else she could think about telling her that might get her to calm down, because Alex didn’t know what had happened to her soulmate. Who had taught her to think so little of herself.
Finally, Maggie’s sobs subsided until she was only sniffling occasionally. Alex kissed her head softly, trying to straighten them up a bit which made Maggie pull back slightly.
“Let me get us some water”, Alex said in soothing voice. “And then we can talk. Or just cuddle. Or sit next to each other in silence. But I won’t leave you again.”
Maggie actually chuckled at that.
“Way to u-haul, Danvers”, she murmured and Alex even got the joke, having thrown herself into research about what it meant to be a lesbian these days. Now she was just glad that Maggie was able to talk again and even joke.
Alex found two bottles of water in the fridge and brought them back over to the sofa where they both emptied them in one go. Alex hadn’t realized how thirsty she had gotten over her aimless driving and zoned out waiting against the door.
“Thanks”, Maggie said finally.
“It was your water”, Alex replied calmly.
“That’s not what I meant”, Maggie whispered, looking up into Alex’s eyes. “Alex, you’re the first person that’s never given up on me. I pushed you away, I lied to you and I hurt you like hell and yet you’re still here. Why?”
“I could never give up on you”, Alex retorted and it was true. “I didn’t believe in all this soulmate stuff until I met you.”
“Yeah, well, part of that is probably my fault”, Maggie said, looking sheepish and averting her eyes again. “Sorry I never replied. I just… I couldn’t.”
And then she told Alex about everything that had happened the day her life had changed irreversibly. About the day her parents had decided that she wasn’t worth the effort, that she was an abomination and not worthy of being loved or even tolerated. Maggie didn’t know why it was suddenly so easy to talk about all of that, but once she had started, she just kept going.
“Sorry, I usually don’t talk that much. Not about myself”, she added when she had somehow finished everything that had happened until she went off to college.
“Have you ever told anybody about that?”, Alex asked, her voice broken, tears running down her face.
“Not like that, no”, Maggie replied, shaking her head. “Well, my aunt knew, but…”
“Thank you for trusting me”, Alex said, swallowing down more tears and hovering her hand over Maggie’s. She wanted to touch her, to comfort her, but she had already sort of forced Maggie into that embrace earlier. Maggie took Alex’s hand and actually smiled at her. And although her face was swollen from the crying, Alex thought she had never seen anything more beautiful.
“Will you tell me what happened to you when you were sixteen?”, Maggie finally wanted to know. Alex looked down, noticing how her hand was suddenly gripping Maggie’s.
“Well, we can at least get all the drama over with in one night”, she mumbled after some contemplating. So, Alex told Maggie about the day her dad died and how that had changed her whole life. She didn’t even stop at college like Maggie had done, but kept going. The only thing she left out for now was that Supergirl was her sister. If this was going to work out, there would come a time for that too.
When Alex was done, it was Maggie that pulled Alex into her arms and Alex who tried to keep her breathing in check and not to break down crying even more. She didn’t succeed.
When they had pulled apart again and both drowned another bottle of water, they cuddled up on the sofa and fell asleep, exhausted from the last few weeks and mostly that day.
“Alex?”
Alex startled awake by the loud voice ringing through the apartment. Feeling disoriented, she lifted herself up, looking around which woke up Maggie as well who had been resting half on top of her and now fell from the sofa.
“Oh, I’m so sorry”, Alex heard her sister’s voice. She turned to look over her shoulder while helping up a very confused looking Maggie, because why would Supergirl stand in her living room?
“I take it you two talked?”, Kara stated with the widest smile Alex had seen her in for a while.
“Yeah”, Alex croaked back, then cleared her throat. “Is there an emergency? Do you need me to come in?”
“No”, Kara replied with an eyeroll. “The emergency was you not replying to any of my texts or calls. I was worried and followed your heartbeat.”
“You can distinguish heartbeats?”, Maggie finally joined the conversation.
“Uhm, yeah”, Kara said. “Sorry that I dropped in like that. But I had to make sure my sister was okay.”
“Sister?”, Maggie repeated, her eyes widening, then moving over to Alex. “Supergirl’s your sister?”
Alex nodded and grumbled: “Have fun with the paperwork.”
“She’s your soulmate, Alex”, Kara defended herself when Alex shot her a scalding look. “She would have found out eventually. Are you hungry?”
Alex was somehow taken aback by the blunt change of topic, but nodded.
“Great, I’ll fly over some breakfast to you and then leave you be”, Kara announced and was out the window before Alex could even protest.
“That explains a lot”, Maggie only stated after a brief moment of silence, blinking up at Alex. “I would have made the connection myself you know.”
“I’m sure you would have, detective”, Alex replied with a smile that Maggie returned.
By the time Kara dropped off their breakfast by the window without stopping to chat again, Alex and Maggie had both been to the bathroom and had put on some fresh clothes, Maggie having lend some to Alex.
They sat down next to each other at Maggie’s table, boring into the food hungrily, both not having had anything to eat for at least twelve hours. They were mostly quiet during their breakfast, but when they had finished, Alex needed to know: “So, are we doing this?”
She looked at Maggie, feeling vulnerable and nervous. She didn’t know how Maggie would react, if she would push her away again. But she needed to know if she was in or not. She was sick of all those uncertainties.
“I’m in”, Maggie said with a nod after a short pause. She looked determined but also slightly afraid.
“Good”, Alex retorted with a small smile. “Then you’ll need to guide me from here because I really don’t know how to do this.”
“It’s not like I had another soulmate before, Alex”, Maggie stated with a small smile, fidgeting with her cup of tea.
“Yeah, but certainly more practice with the whole… relationship thing... and woman thing for that matter”, Alex replied, scrunching up her face in embarrassment.
“Did you ever kiss a woman before?”, Maggie wanted to know, searching Alex’s eyes for an answer before she shook her head.
“Then we’ll maybe start with that - whenever you’re ready”, Maggie said in a low voice, leaning in slightly into Alex’s space but leaving the decision to Alex. Alex swallowed, her eyes darting down to Maggie’s mouth and then back up to her eyes again. A small smile was set firmly on her face, her dimples beginning to show when Alex finally leaned in and closed the distance between them. When their lips met, Alex could feel her stomach lurch and actual butterflies erupt. Warmth spread from her lips down all of her body and she forgot to breathe for a moment. When Maggie pulled back, Alex’s face spread into a wide smile.
“Can we… can we do that again?”, she stuttered, her eyes darting between Maggie’s. Maggie only chuckled, pulled Alex’s chair towards her and kissed her again.