Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

chapter one: the one where they’re cruising in the comfort of a sportscar illusion.

Because National City was a big metropoly, its residents were surely used to seeing weird things going on. In the previous year, a woman claimed she had seen an U.F.O roaming through the skies, which turned out to be the work of some kids messing around with fluorescent lights. Eight months before, a massive balloon of The Cat in the Hat escaped the Thanksgiving Day parade, and flew freely around the city until it collided with the pointy top of a skyscraper, exploding in the air. Also, the news outlets were still reporting an incident that happened two months before, when a caped man pretended he was a superhero and tried to climb the Luthor Tower, which resulted in his fall from 100 feet and into a stack of mattresses set up by the fire department.

Right now, any Nacional City resident living in the surroundings of Noonan’s Coffee Shop could have their own personal share of weird sights, because with one look through the window, they would see a woman in a wedding dress madly running across the street, bursting into the coffee shop, followed by a blonde lady in a buffy purple dress and two men in suits.

-

As soon as the strong smell of freshly-brewed coffee fills her lungs, Alex starts wondering what the hell did she just do.

All eyes turn to her, and Alex, with her wedding dress and white gown, should have seen it coming, but, fuck, she has just run away from her wedding. Her very expensive wedding, and her mom and dad are probably wondering what’s taking her so long in the dressing room, and Maxwell is for sure nervously checking his surroundings looking for her, asking his mother to see if she is alright and, God, Alex feels so dizzy she needs to sit down for a second.

Noonan’s doors burst open again, and Kara, Winn and James run inside looking like the perfect disheveled picture of a Jane Austen book. Alex tries to hide on a booth rounding the corner of the wall, but James spots her anyway, and Alex winces as they all squeeze themselves on the seat opposite to her, staring at her face with curious, impatient eyes.

Winn is the one to break the uncomfortable silence. “So, what’s up, Alex?”

Alex pinches her eyes shut, burying her head between her hands. There’s pounding in her temples and burning behind her eyelids and all she can think about are the flower arrangements set up in the guests’ seats.

Kara touches her arm. “Alex, do you want to go back? Do you wanna talk about what happened?” Alex loves her sister, she really does, but she'll for sure pass out if Kara starts talking calmly with her after she's done the craziest decision of her life.

A waitress shows up, spooked by the scene unfolding before her, and asks if they need anything. “A decaf, please,” James says.

Alex’s hands travel through her hair, undoing the pins that hold down her veil and lessening the effects of the flower smelling hair gel glueing up her hairdo. She gesticulates for the three attentive eyes. “It just - it started just after mom came to - to give me Nana’s wedding bracelet.”

In the haste of showing the jewelry attached to her wrist, Alex almost knocks off the cup of coffee brought by the waitress. “Sorry,” Winn apologizes.

“And then I started looking around at all the presents,” Alex continues. “I was looking at this beautiful expensive gravy boat. And all of the sudden I realise I’m more turned on by the gravy boat than I am by Maxwell.”

Kara reaches out again, sympathy spilling from her eyes. “Alex..”

She sighs. “I started wondering what I was doing, and who was I doing this for and I just - I had to get out of there.”

Kara gets up from the booth to hold her, purple bridesmaid dress and all. Alex stomach somersaults when her mind floods with the vision of the big wedding cake with the wife and groom dolls on top, and the tables decorated with petunias, her favorite flowers.

“It’s okay,” Kara reassures, stroking her arm. “It’s fine. I’m sure mom and dad will understand.”

Alex widens her eyes. “Oh my God. Maxwell and I had bought that apartment upstate. I can never go back there. Fuck, where am I gonna live?”

“Don’t worry,” James says, reaching out for her hand. “Winn and I will go back there tomorrow to get your stuff.”

“And you can always live with me for a while,” Kara says, million-dollar worth smile. “Think of how cool it’ll be, you and I living together again.”

Winn points to himself. “And you get to have an awesome neighbor who makes the best apple pies and can always lent you the whole Star Wars collection.”

They all stare at her with soft eyes mingled with understanding and affection, and Alex smiles even though she feels like crying. “Thank you, guys. Really. Thank you.”

Kara sits down again. “And look at the bright side. At least you get to keep the presents.”

Winn clears his throat, reaching for his cellphone and avoiding looking at the three of them in the eye. “And, um, what was the brand of that gravy boat again? The one you got turned on by? You know, for dinner purposes.”

-

There’s peanut butter on his face that Winn doesn’t even know where it came from. He’s dressed up all nicely, has cleaned the apartment to resemble an organized place, even bought a few cookies to greet the folks coming and going, and, biggest thing of all, has not eaten any of the cookies. Ok, yeah, maybe he’s eaten one.

Or seven.

Anyway. He’s ready to receive the people who have signed up to potentially be his roommate, and Kara said he should look presentable, that’s why he’s even wearing his lucky bowtie. But a peanut butter-covered face - that doesn’t scream presentable.

James enters while he’s in front of the mirror, gently wiping the sticky mess away. “Ohh, cookies.”

“Don’t touch that,” Winn exclaims, face still dripping with soap.

“Why not?” James asks, munching one of the sweets. Great, now James has eaten one of the cookies and Winn had to stop before the 8th.

He moves the cookie basket from the counter to the foosball table by the corner. “They’re to my future roommates.”

James produces a carton of milk that Winn has no idea about the expiration date from the refrigerator, and dumps the rest of his cookie in it. “Oh, yeah, I forgot you had this thing today. You’re still up for picking up Alex’s things later?”

“Yeah, sure, I think it’s gonna be quick today,” Winn answers. “Do you think we’ll be back by six? I have rehearsals for the play later.”

He goes back to the bathroom to wipe himself, and James’ voice rings behind him. “Yeah, think so. Also, I hope you get any normal roomies this time around.”

Winn snorts. He’s been holding these roommate auditions for a couple of weeks now, and no one who has visited him had that sort of roommate material. There was this girl, very tall, very pretty with her honey-coloured hair and green eyes, a dancer: Winn sensed from their first exchange of looks that she had the potential to hold one of the keys to his heart, and he honestly wasn’t sure if it was the right time to open that door. There was also this dude, very regular with a mustache covering his upper lip, had a pet fish and all, and seemed pretty chill and normal until he received a phone call from his ex-girlfriend, and started yelling and swearing and name-calling. Winn didn’t want no macho living around him when he himself didn’t feel really connected with this whole masculinity thing.

Truth is, he feels better and more free living by himself, nobody judging whether he’s just came home after watching a play or an action movie, with a guy or a girl, in a pink or blue shirt, but being an actor in Nacional City was proving to be harder and harder, and money was short, so he had to resort to having his privacy invaded and his space probed. Great, just great.

James is still making himself very comfortable with the space of his living room by the time Winn leaves the bathroom. “What are you still doing here?” he asks.

James scans the magazines by the couch, not once lifting up his eyes. “Lucy is, um, finishing packing, and I couldn’t stand being there much longer.”

Stroking his hand through James’ hair in what he hopes is a comforting gesture, Winn grimaces. “Oh, man. I’m sorry.”

“No, don’t be,” James says with pursed lips, getting up. He stands with his hands stuffed into his sweatshirt, looking every bit like the guy Winn met back in college. “It’s fine, I was expecting it.”

“It’ll get better, you’ll see.”

“Yep,” James agrees, popping the consonant. “Do you think Kara still has some of that guava ice cream? I could really use the comfort provided by excessive sugar.”

Winn shrugs. “I dunno. You should go check it out.”

“Yeah, I should,” James says, moving to the door. “Hey, good luck on your search, huh? Let’s hope for the best today.”

“Thank you,” Winn calls out, but James has already gone.

He only has a few seconds to look through his apartment, wondering if there’s any way to improve his appearance to make the best first impression possible, even thinking if it’d be okay if he took a little bite of one of the cookies, maybe just a quarter of one, when there’s a knock.

On the way to the door, he takes a deep breath, muttering to himself, “You can do it, Winn. You’re an actor. You can portray the part of a clean cut man.”

Bright green eyes greet him on the other side of the door, stunning him for a moment. The woman standing before Winn could easily pass for a vampire, with her pale skin and dark hair. A Caltech hoodie undoes her Stoker-esque demeanor, and a knife tattoo spanning the entirety of her right forearm makes images of vampires fade from Winn’s mind, and secret agent ones take place.

Spy-Lady waves a hand across his face. “Hello?”

Winn snaps from his daze. “Oh, hi. Hello. Are you here for the available room?”

“I am,” she says. The tattoo creates the fake impression that Winn is being stabbed when they shake hands, and he ponders that the drawing might’ve been made especially to intimidate. “You must be the owner. I’m Lena Luthor, nice to meet you.”

“Winn Schott. Please come in.”

Winn frowns, trying to remember where he knows that name from. “Sorry, is your family famous? I feel like I’ve heard your name before.”

Lena chuckles. “Yes, um, a man tried to climb my family’s business company building about three months ago.”

“Luthor Tower,” he exclaims, and the woman hums in agreement. “Man, I always wondered how that dude managed to get up there.”

“Don’t ask me, I wouldn’t know,” Lena says, and something about her voice tone clues Winn that this subject isn’t a favorite of hers. She looks around, taking in the living room. “So, is this it?”

Winn nods. “Yeah. Your bedroom would be the one on the right, and there’s a bathroom on the corner right there.” Lena takes a peek behind the doors, and Winn’s so happy he cleaned the apartment. “I know it’s small, but - “

“No,” Lena interrupts. “It’s great, really. It’s just what I’m looking for.”

Winn sits on the counter, legs in the air. “This is a great neighbourhood, you know. Very clean and almost no violence. Also, there’s this great restaurant-slash-coffee shop just two streets over that serves the absolute best pancakes.”

“I do like good pancakes,” Lena says, and Winn chuckles.

“So, what do you do?” he asks, eyeing the hoodie that clearly indicates science-related stuff.

“I’m a chef, actually,” she says, and suddenly the knife makes a lot more sense. “I work at that place downtown, Iridium.”

Winn hums. “Oh, I’ve been there before with my friend James. We loved the crab cakes.”

Lena smiles, looking very sincere and thankful, ducking her head in bashfullness. “Thank you.”

“Yeah, no problem.” Winn gestures to the cookies resting on top of the foosball table, and, when Lena grabs one, he feels like he can eat a little too. “Y’know, I thought you were like a scientist or something,” he says with his mouth full, gesturing to the Caltech symbol on Lena’s clothes.

The woman looks rather sheepish, and clouds roam over her face too fast for Winn to comprehend it. “I actually did three years of Mechanical Engineering but, um, I figured it wasn’t for me.”

“Really? Why’s that?”

Lena shrugs, grabbing another cookie and leaning against the table. “I was mostly doing this for the sake of managing my parents company. They always expected me and my brother to follow their footsteps, but I guess I wished to be more than what they wanted me to be.”

Winn can for sure understand that feeling. Having grown up with his grandma after his father was arrested for drug trafficking, the fear of entering a life of crime always loomed over his head, but he, too, wanted to be more than the person his dad set him up to be.

Lena laughs humorlessly. “Sorry, I’m oversharing.”

“No, no,” Winn rushes out. “Not at all. I can, um, totally relate to what you mean.”

The woman clears her throat, wanting to move on from that subject. “So, what about you? Where do you work?”

Winn puffs out his chest. “I’m an actor.”

“Really? Anything I might’ve seen?”

“Only if you managed to catch the Pinocchio production at the little theater in the park,” a voice speaks behind both of them, and Winn turns swiftly to see Kara standing in the doorway, mischievous look in her eyes.

“Hey, that was a job alright,” he grumbles as she comes in, also grabbing a handful of cookies. “Lena, this is Kara, my long-time friend. She lives across the hall. Kara, Lena is auditioning for the roommate position.”

They exchange pleasantries and a hand-shake, and Winn notices how Lena’s eyes roam the plane of his friends’ upper arm, scattered with writing-related tattoos.

“Hey, nice tattoo,” Kara compliments, and Winn almost rolls his eyes at the obviousness of this.

Before Lena can answer, the soft rock of her phone’s ringtone chimes in the small room, and she speaks with whoever’s on the other side of the line with a permanent frown on her face.

She turns to him and Kara, now fervently eating away the chocolate chip cookies, with a bashful look. “I’m sorry, there’s been an emergency at the restaurant, I’m afraid I’ll have to go.”

Winn swallows. “Oh, that’s alright.”

Lena gathers her things, moving backwards to the door. “I really liked the place. I hope I get the room.”

“I’ll give you a call.”

She nods. “That’s great. It was really nice to meet you both.”

Kara waits a few seconds after Lena’s closed the door, to make sure she’s all the way down the stairs, before she actually comments. “Cute girl, huh?”

Winn narrows his eyes. “Don’t get your hopes up, I still have a couple of people to interview.”

His friend has the audacity to look offended. “What do you mean? I’m just saying.”

“Yeah, like I didn’t see you dripping charm and that little “hey, nice tattoo” comment,” he raises his voice to imitate Kara’s, and she scoffs. He’s known Kara for 7 years now, is capable to identify all of her little flirting methods.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She grabs a couple more cookies, and, as she’s about to leave, says, “Why there’s peanut butter on your neck?”

“What?”

He storms into the bathroom, looking in the mirror and spotting the peanut butter right where his neck meets the collarbone. As he furiously wipes it away, he thinks that, despite everything, he might’ve found his roommate after all.

-

Kara’s parents visit her apartment about a week after the whole marriage fiasco. Alex has just started settling down, occupying Kara’s spare bedroom the same way she did during their childhood, when they had to share a living space: movie posters cover the walls, perfumes crowd the desks and old books decorate a makeshift bookcase they managed to build.

Eliza and Jeremiah agree to come have dinner with them, and Kara prepares a Shepherd's Pie in the hopes it’ll make everyone full and sated, so they can at least have a pleasant evening, food wise.

Alex’s shoes clattering as she moves from one side of the living room to the other make it impossible for Kara to focus on anything else, and she gives up writing the 2000-word piece her boss wants ready by monday so they can publish it on tuesday in favor of simply staring at her sister.

Running away from the wedding was a risky decision that might’ve affected her sister’s life forever, but Kara can see that it was the right thing to do. During the two years Alex and Maxwell Lord were engaged, she never saw her sister truly happy, and the commitment they made together was one based on convenience and not true love. They met in college, dated a little, Maxwell proposed and her sister felt like she couldn’t say no.

Even completely comfortable with her decision, Kara still knew Alex valued their parent’s opinion more than anything, hence almost making a whole on the very expensive carpet of her living room.

“Alex,” she calls out, to no response. Her sister is muttering under her breath, chewing the tips of her fingers. She tries again. “Alex.”

Alex comes to a halt when thumps sound from the apartment below, and Kara recognizes the notes of complain in the voice that accompanies them. Only then her sister appears to become aware of her surroundings, murmuring, “I’m sorry.”

Kara waves to the table. “Take a seat, and calm down. Everything’s gonna be fine.”

Alex’s knuckles crack when she starts wringing her hands, and Kara is transported to their childhood in Midvale, and that time Alex had to tell their parents she adopted a stray cat. The same nervousness that seemed to flood her mind back then fills her body right now, and Kara wishes she could take some of those feelings for herself.

Alex sighs. “I know it’s gonna be fine, I just - wish I didn’t have to tell them.”

The timer goes off, and Kara rushes to take the pie out of the oven, marvelling at its crisp exterior. Her hands burn through the dishcloth, and she places the dish on the table. “They’re gonna be kinda weird about it at first, but once they see how at ease you look, they’ll support you a hundred percent.”

“I just hope you’re right,” Alex says, and the doorbell rings. “Oh, God.”

“Be calm,” Kara says with a little wave, heading to the door. “Go get some wine.”

Her parents dive in to hug her as she opens the door, and Kara is engulfed into the type of warmth that always makes her feel safe, whether she’s twenty-one and fresh out of college or nine years old and recently orphaned. For the past 15 years, Eliza and Jeremiah have been constant in her life, and she’s happy to notice the ocean smell they carry from living their whole life by the beach hasn’t changed at all.

Eliza hands her a heavy dish. “It’s a trifle. Hurry, go put it in the refrigerator.”

Jeremiah closes the door and when Kara turns to head to the fridge, Alex downs a whole glass of wine in one sitting.

“Oh, Alex,” Eliza says, giving her a hug. “It’s okay, honey.”

Jeremiah chimes in, “I always thought you looked like Julia Roberts a little.”

“Nice Runaway Bride reference,” Kara laughs, high-fiving her dad.

Alex sighs, and Kara can visibly see the weight falling down from her shoulders. “So you guys are alright with what happened? I’m so sorry I left everyone waiting at the church.”

“Absolutely, sweetheart,” Jeremiah says, circling his arms around Alex’s shoulders. “We understand you wouldn’t be happy marrying Maxwell, and we just want you to be happy.”

Kara thinks Alex is gonna cry when she pulls both of theirs parents for a hug, resting her head on top of Eliza’s shoulder. “Besides, we never liked Maxwell very much,” Eliza confides, eyes sparkling. “He was so - uptight.”

“And boring,” Jeremiah adds. “I feel lucky I’ll never have to sit through another stock market conversation with him.”

Kara reaches out to grab Alex’s hands, communicating with one look that she was right about the support from their parents. “Ok, everyone,” she calls out. “Let’s all sit down and eat, yeah? I don’t want this pie to get cold.”

Their parents share the things that happened after Alex run away. Kara laughs so hard during her dad’s retelling of how furious Maxwell was as soon as he found out about Alex’s absence that wine spills from her nose, staining her white shirt forever. Through dinner, Alex relaxes and loses that jumpy atmosphere, being able to laugh at the mention of her wedding and calmly explain to her parents her thought process moments before she left. A deep frown she was cultivating since the wedding day dissipates at every bite of the potato and meat feast, and disappears completely by the time they’re all finished with desert.

She get up suddenly, kissing their parents on the cheek and leaving the apartment under the claim of “taking out the trash”, but Kara notices something weird in her eyes.

She sighs, and prevents herself from following her sister, aware that she needs some alone time tonight. What Kara does instead is look for some Tupperware amidst the mess under her sink, wrapping the rest of the pie so her parents can take home.

-

Alex was 17 the first time she had a smoke.

It was her last week in high school, and technically she had already been accepted to study Law at Yale, so she figured she could let loose for those last few days, do the things she couldn’t do with the pressure to enter a good school and the responsibility of being a flawless older sister looming down her back.

So, when Vicky Donahue invited her for a party at Kenny Li’s house, she decided to forego her usual decline in favor of having some fun for once.

Alex had tasted alcoholic beverages before the party, having a small glass of wine with her parents the night they received the acceptance letter, so the whole alcohol induced atmosphere didn’t scare her off. Quite the contrary, she gladly accepted a beer bottle Vicky passed her, sipping on it for most of the night.

She really didn’t want to try weed, though, having grown up in a house of doctors, so when a couple of boys offered her a cigarette when the party had moved from the living room to the pool area, she figured she had nothing to lose, and took it.

Her first smoke was muddled with the inexperience of a first timer, but as soon as she got used to the weight of the cigarette between her lips, Alex could feel the pleasant sensations of the nicotine cursing through her body, numbing the tips of her fingers and relaxing her eyelids. The troubles of her teenage life felt very far away in that moment, and Alex couldn’t care less if Vicky was kissing some boy in the living room closet or if her family couldn’t quite pay her college bills.

That was the first time her mind felt blank, and Alex loved that feeling.

Smoking became a good friend of hers, following her to the toughest moments of college to the days she wanted to quit her job and to her post-sex moments with Maxwell, when she was desperate to escape the feeling of his body on top of hers.

Alex started associating the need to smoke with the occasions where her life felt like falling apart, so is no surprise she’s here right now: outside Kara’s building, leaning against the lamp post near the stairs, smoke filling in and blowing out of her lungs.

Despite the approval and understanding of her parents, Alex still feels jittery, like the last week of her life was nothing but a daydream. Looking at the bikers crossing through the street in front of her, their movements feel oddly slow, and yet again Alex questions the decisions she made with absolute certainty.

“Fuck.” The muttered swear catches her attention, and Alex turns to see a tall brunette unloading boxes out of her car. A mess of books and CDs spread across the ground, and she figures one of the boxes might’ve ripped.

Alex presses the rest of the cigarette on the concrete floor, throwing it haphazardly on the street, and heads towards the strange woman. “Would you like some help with that?” she asks.

The darkest brown eyes Alex’s ever seen greet her, and Alex’s tongue goes heavy.

The woman furrows her brows. “Alex Danvers?”

“Um, yeah,” Alex answers, curious to how that woman knows her name. Studying the curve of her jaw and the sharpness of her nose, Alex remembers algebra equations written across the blackboard and tiny cartons of milk being paired with fresh apples, and then it clicks. “Oh my God, Sam Arias?”

Sam smiles. “The one and only.”

Alex approaches the woman, amazed with how she’s changed over the past 10 years. “Wow. It’s been a minute.”

“Yeah, since Junior Year,” Sam says, leaning against the open truck of her dark car and crossing her arms. “We both survived Midvale High, who would’ve guessed?”

Alex laughs, the first truly genuine one in about a week, and fresh air fills in and blows out of her lungs. “So what’s been going on with you these days?”

Sam starts moving again, finishing picking up the books she dropped before, and Alex moves on to help, marvelling at the colorful covers and different genres. “I’ve actually got a couple books published.”

“Oh, really? Anything I would know?” Alex did remember taking advanced literature with Sam, even pairing up with her to do trickier assignments, and even feeling kinda blind from the street lights, she can see similar eagerness in adult-Sam as well.

Sam grimaces. “I don’t think so. Unless you got really into mellow, sugary heterosexual romances this past decade.”

“Doesn’t seem like me.”

“Not the Alex Danvers I remember,” Sam’s voice sounds low, face hidden amidst the shadows of the night, and Alex blushes at the multiple implications of that sentence. She busies herself studying the suitcases inside the truck and the remaining boxes, some named bathroom stuff, kitchen utensils and manuscripts.

“Are you moving here?” she asks.

Sam unloads more cases, placing them on the sidewalk, and that’s when Alex finally notices her appearance: wearing a black tank top and dark jeans with chains, Sam looks like she recently escaped a 90’s punk rock movie, and the countless tattoos covering both of her arms help complete that vibe. She can only make out some of them: a very distinctive typewriter on one forearm, feathers spanning from her elbow to her wrist, and nom de plume written in very fancy letters.

“Yeah,” Sam grunts, wiping some sweat of her forehead, and Alex can’t understand why her stomach twists and turns. “My agent wanted me to be closer to the publishing houses and we found this really good vacant apartment here. Second floor, number 12.”

Alex bites her lip. “I just moved here too, with my sister. We’re on 20.”

Sam just looks at her for a few moments, and Alex feels like she’s trying to uncover well-hidden truths, invading the private space of her mind. There’s a glint in her eyes that Alex hasn’t seen in anyone in a long time, and she almosts wants to break eye contact, but Sam does it first.

“Well, maybe we can get some coffee someday,” Sam says, pronouncing every word carefully. “You know, to reminisce old times.”

Before Alex can respond, a huge man shows up on the doorway, collecting Sam’s boxes and urging her to hurry up. She looks at Alex with sorrowful eyes, and picks up a box saying cookbooks.

“I guess I’ll see you around, Danvers.”

As she leaves, Alex’s tongue remains bound to the roof of her mouth, and she can do nothing but watch as Sam’s retrieving form enters the building, closing the door on the way in.

Alex’s ears pitch, and her mouth feels dry from the alcohol she had during dinner.

She fetches another cigarette, thinking she might as well.

-

Kara insists on trying the new recipe for Hamantaschen her mother got from her shul friends and sent via email, so Friday night finds her and Alex kneading dough and preparing raspberry filling while Alex’s Spotify playlist plays on the background. It’s Purim in a couple of weeks, and Kara wants to test this recipe now so nothing goes wrong when she needs to do it for her family.

Right now, she’s pretty pleased. She doesn’t consider herself a great cook, but Eliza always said that it seemed like she had super senses: Kara could identify by look, touch or smell whether any food was good or bad, and don’t even get started on taste, which was by far Kara’s most refined sense.

Kara sets the dough on the table, stretching it with her hands, marvelling at the little lumps and bubbles made by the air.

“So, something odd happened to me a couple nights ago,” Alex says, adding water and sugar to the fruits in the blender. Kings of Leon rings through the speaker, a song Kara remembers from her teenagehood.

She adds flour to her dough, waiting in silence until Alex continues. “Sam Arias is moving to the building.”

Kara frowns. “Sammy from the soccer team?”

“Yep,” Alex answers, popping the consonant. Her eyes track the movement made by the berries.

“I liked Sammy. She was really pretty, and used to call me Little Danvers,” Kara says, greasing a couple of pans, hiding the fact Sammy always seemed to have candy to give 12-year-old Kara.

“Yeah, she was pretty nice,” Alex says, pouring the finalized filling into a large bowl on the center of the table. She almost drops the whole thing on the floor, and Kara’s heart literally fucking stops until she understands the look on her sister’s eyes.

But maybe she should let Kara take care of cooking now, so she takes the filling away from Alex, motioning for her to sit down. “Why was it odd, though?”

Alex shrugs, and The Smiths starts playing through the speakers. “I dunno. We were talking, it was dark outside and I just - I started having these memories of high school and how much simpler life was back then. I guess I just felt weirdly connected to her.”

“I think that’s normal,” Kara says after a moment’s thought, cutting the dough into triangular shapes. “You’re in a sensitive spot right now, wondering if you made the right decision, and she reminded you of times where making these types of choices never crossed your mind.

Kara starts gently placing the filling on top of the dough, still with raspberry chunks that she knows Jeremiah really likes, Morrissey singing fiercely about a charming man, until she notices her sister has gone quiet.

She lifts up her head, and sees Alex looking intently at her, smirk coating the corner of her mouth. “You’re awfully poetic sometimes,” her sister says.

Kara scrunches up her nose, throwing a dishcloth at Alex’s face. “Shut up.”

Ignoring what her sister said, Kara makes a mental note to re-read the email she needs to send to her boss, Snapper, and find parts in the article she’s writing that need improvement. She’s really excited about this piece covering the underground superhero scene of National City, and Kara knows that nailing this article might open more doors to her in the future.

Winn bursts through the unlocked door in his usual fashion, and Kara could have been scared if she didn’t knew he does this everytime. This time, though, he’s being followed by a woman Kara vaguely remembers from almost a month ago.

“Good, you’re both here,” Winn says, dragging the woman to the edge of the table they’re sitting. She almost looks embarrassed, and Kara can’t help but notice red spilling from her cheeks to her neck and chest. “Guys, I wanted to introduce you to my new roommate, Lena Luthor.”

“We’ve met,” Kara remembers, sending the woman a wave and a smile. Lena returns it, shiny and charming, and Kara has to mentally stop herself from dropping the biscuit train, placing it inside the oven.

“We haven’t,” her sister says, standing up to greet Lena. “Alex Danvers, hi.”

Kara can see that Alex also eyes curiously the tattoo on the woman’s arm. Were she not wearing a sweater, the roles could be reversed, and Lena would be staring at some of the tattoos covering her sisters arms: rubik’s cubes, flowers, birds, and - Kara’s favorite - a remaking of the René Magritte’s painting The Lovers II, but with two girls.

They shake hands. “Lena Luthor, nice to meet you.”

“Lena works at Iridium,” Winn exclaims, making exaggerated faces at Kara, knowing he can totally share his food-happiness with her.

Alex hums. “Loved the scallops there.”

Lena thanks her, cheeks tainted red again. An itch that started bothering Kara back when they first met ceases, and she finally makes the connection. “Oh, Luthor tower,” she says, snapping her fingers.

Shaking her head from side to side, Lena agrees, “Yeah, the place a crazy man climbed 100 feet while pretending to be a superhero.”

Kara remembers not finishing the section in her article about this man and what spurred him to act like a spider man, and she has half a mind of asking that to Lena before James also enters the apartment as if he lives there. It’s like no one knocks anymore.

She forgives him when she notices his sullen expression, mouth downcast and moisture around the eyes, and her concern over her friend increases even more when he says, heavily leaned against the door, “Hi.”

“This guy says hello, I wanna kill myself,” Winn says with laughter in his voice, being the last one to realise the situation is not meant for chuckles.

Kara looks over her shoulder to check the calendar, and, crap, today really was the day.

“Are you okay, dude?” Winn asks, voice now much more serious and solicitous.

James sighs, heading towards the couch. “I just feel like someone reached down my throat, grabbed my small intestine, pulled it out of my mouth,” he lays down, mindful of his shoes on the white surface. “And also tied it around my neck.”

Lena looks a little lost, so Alex chimes in, “His ex-wife moved out today. She’s a lesbian.”

James groans. “Don’t need to be reminding me that all the time.” He frowns, lifting up his head and pointing to Lena. His eyes look a little bloodshot, so Kara reaches around for some leftover pudding, hoping to cheer him up. “Hey, I don’t know you.”

“I’m Winn’s new roommate, Lena,” she introduces herself, and they shake hands. She grimaces. “I’m also a lesbian.”

James wails again, and Kara hurries to the couch with the two servings of the snack, her friend muttering something that sounds very much like “they’re everywhere!” into a pillow.

-

It needs to be said that Winn isn’t the biggest fan of hockey. Or of sports in general, really. During high school, he got weirdly obsessed with soccer after watching a few matches of the all-girls team, but once Winn realised what he really enjoyed was seeing Becky Green’s face all red and bossing the other girls around, his interest in the sport died rather quickly.

However, when Kara texted him one afternoon saying she got tickets to the latest hockey game Winn didn’t even know who was playing, and said that the two of them, as James’ best friends, should turn blind eyes to their complete lack of knowledge on the sport in favor of taking James to the game to try and cheer him up, it was hard to deny.

That’s how he found himself one thursday night, squeezed between Kara and small child wearing all blue, sitting on a bench that Winn was sure was covered in beer, waiting for the start of the match between the National City Rangers and the Gotham City Penguins.

At least James was smiling, staring at the big thumb he convinced Kara to buy, thoughts very far away from Lucy and her new lesbian lover.

Was it worth the fact Winn was probably stepping on some soggy fried chicken? Eh, maybe not so much.

“See, we’re having fun, aren’t we?” Kara says through the noise, squeezing James’ arm.

He smiles. “It feels good to actually clear my mind a little,” he answers. James reaches around to grab Winn and Kara’s hands, almost hitting them in the face with the styrofoam thum. “Thank you so much for doing this, guys. It means a lot to me.”

“Don’t mention it,” Winn says, dismissing the words with a wave of his hand. He points to the big screen. “So that’s where people kiss, right?”

James frowns. “Wait. Is today the 15th, march 15th?”

Kara nods, popping a fish nugget into her mouth. “Yeah, why?”

Shoulder dropping, James lets out a sad huff. “What’s wrong with the 15th?” Winn asks.

“Today is the day - the day Lucy and I first, you know,” James stutters, his head buried between his shoulders. “First consummated our relationship.”

Kara almost chokes, and it takes severe willpower for Winn not to laugh, so he bites his lip, hard. He wishes the buzz around the stadium was louder so he didn’t have to hear this.

“Wow, man, um - let’s just keep that image out of our thoughts, okay?”

“Please,” Kara strangles out, taking a sip of water to subside her cough.

Winn smothers a hand up and down her back. “Now explain to us a little about the game, please? Otherwise we’ll be kinda lost here.”

The match starts twenty minutes later, and even if initially Winn was only paying attention to the stretch of the players’ muscles under the tight uniforms, halfway through the game he starts cheering up loudly to the Rangers, infected by the bustle of the audience.

The little disc moves fast between the guys’ legs, and Winn is happy to be there even if is kinda hard to follow. He, James and Kara are all standing up now, cursing the rival players and giving instructions to the Rangers as if they’ll hear.

The three of them yell when the National City team scores again, and Winn receives hugs and pats on the back from strangers.

“See, all you needed was a bunch of toothless guys hitting each other with sticks,” Kara yells.

The Rangers are attacking again, and James screams, “Pass it! Pass it!”

Winn points to a player in the corner. “He’s open.”

“Shoot, shoot, shoot,” the three of them yell in synchrony.

In what feels like slow motion, the player shoots to the goal, but another player intercepts the pluck, that goes flying through the ring and the protective barrier, hitting James square in the face.

He falls down with a thump, clutching his nose.

“Hey, look, we’re on that TV thing,” Winn says animatedly, waving, until Kara punches his arm, and, yeah, friend on the floor, priorities.

-

James has never felt so much pain in his entire life.

The hospital people medicated him, filled his body with analgesics while he waits to see the doctor, but even numb his soul feels like it’s lifting out of his body.

He’s laying his head in Kara’s lap, they’re both on the floor and his friend is lightly running her fingers through the lines of his hair while James forces himself not to breath too hard not to smudge Kara’s jeans with blood.

Winn arrives back with a grimace and a cup filled with ice. “How you’re feeling, buddy?”

“Like Lucy leaving me isn’t the thing that hurts the most anymore,” he says, placing the plastic cup directly on his nose. His eyes start to water. “Oh, man, ice.”

“What, what is it?” Kara asks, concerned.

James sits up slowly, supporting his head on the wall. “It was snowing when Lucy and I had sex for the first time.”

Winn and Kara share a tense look, and James closes his eyes, letting the ice burn his skin.

It’s not like he wants to think about Lucy all the time, and he doesn’t want to bore his friends to death or make them uncomfortable when he’s rambling about this, but damn it, he misses his wife, ok? It’s nobody’s fault she turned out to be a lesbian and started going out with this pre-school teacher named Susan Vasquez and who James once thought was just Lucy’s great friend - not her secret girlfriend - but he is allowed to complain once in a while, and reminisce the good, happy times they shared.

Also, his nose is swollen with the size of a fucking fist, so there’s some things he just gotta do.

Winn gets up abruptly, and, with his eyes closed, James can only hear when he goes up to the receptionist, complaining that many other people were seen before him even though he arrived first. The receptionist tells him off, and James head pounds with the effort to stay awake. He might have a concussion, after all.

“What’s the big deal about tonight, though?” Winn asks, handing him another cup full of ice. James opens his eyes. “You slept with her for the first time, yeah. You slept with her for five years after that.”

James slowly shakes his head. He can feel his face getting warmer, but doesn’t know if it’s because of the embarrassment or because the blood is rushing to his head. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Is it because she’s gay?” Kara asks.

“No, it’s just…” He huffs. “My first time with Lucy was - you know, my first time.”

“With Lucy?” Winn repeats. Kara sends him a dirty look. “Oh.”

Kara clears her throat, and James wishes the hockey disc had hit his eyes so he wouldn’t need to see their faces. “So, all your life you’ve only been with this one girl? Wow.”

Winn widens his eyes, getting up quickly. “Oh, man, hockey tonight was a big mistake - big mistake, huge.”

James almost gestures to tell them to forget they said anything, but before that a woman with gentle eyes arrives in the waiting room calling his name.

On his way to the doctor’s room, James’ only wish is that his recommended medicine is a large puff of oblivion gas.

-

Alex, Kara, the boys and Lena - who has become a surprising constant fixture in their little gatherings, bonding quickly with James over photography and with Alex because of their common childhood interest in molecular biology - settle for watching TV in the girl’s living room, eating away a pepperoni pizza and telling little anecdotes of their lives.

James, with an ice pack over his nose and bandages patched all around his head, occupies the entire couch, so the other four have to struggle for space: Alex and her sister squeeze together in the armchair, Winn lays on the floor propped by some pillows, and Lena fetches a chair from the kitchen.

A spanish soap opera no one really understands is on, and they have fun trying to make out what the characters are saying. After a hilarious moment when Kara and Winn dub a scene where a woman is thrown down several flights of stairs - it’s so funny James even wakes up from his nap with all the laughter -, Alex gets up to check on the cake she has in the oven.

It seems like lately all they do is cook in the apartment, but, scrolling through Instagram during a break in the office, Alex came up with the brilliant idea that maybe doing something she never did before - like baking a cake - would help her get in control of her life. Hence, the creams and cookie batter coming to life in the oven.

It wasn’t that easy, though, because even if Alex prided herself in being a very smart person with two PhDs, some things just weren’t for her, like riding a horse, speaking german, and, well, baking a cake.

She burned it twice. Alex didn’t even understand how such a simple thing made with flour, eggs and milk could inflame with such ease. The third try simply tasted bad - that was when she realized she was using salt instead of sugar all along.

Alex was on the verge of quitting when Lena arrived, calmed her down and taught her the step by step process of making a simple cake. It all seemed much easier with a professional chef guiding her, and Alex kinda liked this metaphor - you can fail many times while trying to heal by yourself, but it might just take one try when you have support.

Taking out her cake, Alex marvels at the shiny exterior, cutting a still hot piece and almost burning her mouth.

A knock sounds on the door and Alex, fanning her burning tongue, answers it.

The sight of Sam Arias fills her vision. Staring at the woman with a white see-through shirt and dark wash jeans, Alex feels a little silly with her mouth full, so she swallows it quickly while Sam quirks an eyebrow.

“Sorry. Hi, Sam. What’s up?”

Sam wrings her hands, and Alex is fascinated by the sight. “I was wondering if I could collect that coffee you owe me.”

Alex widens her eyes, but is prevented from answering when Kara yells from the living room. “Alex, who is it?” Her sister approaches the door, and Alex bites her tongue so hard she tastes blood.

“Kara Danvers, it’s been some time,” Sam says, smiling brightly.

“Sammy!” Alex knows her sister hardly has boundaries regarding personal space, so it’s no surprise when she leans forward to wrap Sam in a hug. They look like old friends, and Alex is reminded of how Kara’s bright personality made her a star during their teenagehood, genuinely adored by all the students in Midvale High.

“Come in, come in,” Kara urges, taking Sam inside, and she shares a brief look with Alex as if to put their previous conversation on hold, and, honestly, Alex wouldn’t even know what to say. “Everybody, this is Sam, Alex and I went to high school with her.”

A chorus of hellos reverberates through the living room, and James sends his personal grunt.

Time seems like a foreign concept after that. Kara invites Sam to stay for the pizza they ordered, and Winn digs up a bunch of old board games he has in his apartment. Alex learns that Lena is unbeatable at Monopoly, somehow managing to make every single one of them broke, and that Kara and Sam make for an invencible pair during Scrabble. She later manages to prove her worth during Clue, and it’s the most fun night Alex has had in a long time. They all eat her cake by the end of the evening, moaning together at how good it tastes, and she and Lena share a secret smile.

Her initial hesitation about inviting Sam to their little group soon died out with the woman’s simple energy and downright hilariousness, and Alex even manages to forget her obvious invitation for a date earlier that evening and the fact that she probably should say something.

Everytime their eyes meet across the game board, Alex bites the inside of her cheek at the fire simmering low behind Sam’s eyelids.

It’s almost midnight when they start putting away the large mat setup for Twister - James woke up and guided them through the placement of their limbs - and Sam is the big winner of the night. Her and Alex stand side by side while picking up discarded plastic plates and cups, and Alex can feel everywhere their shoulders and arms touch.

Winn starts dozing off against the refrigerator, so Lena announces she will take him to bed across the hall, apologizing for leaving the mess uncleaned.

Kara waves her off. “Don’t worry,” she says, helping James get up and giving him a new ice pack. “I was just about to take this one home.”

James looks pretty drugged up in all the painkillers, so Kara decides to walk him to his apartment - barely 100 steps away from theirs -, make sure he changes and has a way to call them if he needs any help.

“You’re gonna have to change my bandages,” James slurs out, and even from a distance Alex can see the blood dripping from his nose to his mouth, catching sight of Kara grimacing before they leave the apartment.

It’s just her and Sam then, and Alex can feel the air sparkling with energy.

Sam leaves the pizza box by the sink, and Alex, washing the utensils she used to make the cake, can feel her leaning against the back of the couch. She clears her throat. “Just saw on Facebook that Julia Spier is having triplets.”

Alex frowns. “Who?”

“You don’t remember Julia?” Sam asks, mouth curved in a soft grin. It’s curious how she always seems to be smiling around Alex. “Played with me on the soccer team?”

“You mean Gospel Jules?” Alex gasps, remembering her the very religious girl she had History classes with, who always assured her that Jesus loves you even though you’re Jewish.

Sam nods. “I guess Jesus is the source of all life after all.”

Alex dries out her hands, leaning against the sink and sharing a laugh with Sam. “Wow, high school was a crazy long time ago.”

“Yeah,” Sam hums, cracking her knuckles. “You know, you probably don’t know this, but I had this major crush on back in high school.”

Alex eyes widen, and suddenly a lot of things seem to fall into place: how Sam made an effort to get to know Kara, why she liked to be partnered up with Alex during chemistry class, that time she lent Alex that Tegan and Sara CD. Ugh, she feels like an idiot now, too caught up in drama with Vicky to notice things going on around her.

“I didn’t know.”

Sam bites her lip. “Well, I did,” she says, cheeks pink. “Actually, um, do you think - and please don’t let my intense good looks get in the way here,” they share a brief smile, “Do you think it would be ok if I asked you out sometime? Like, on a date and not with some flimsy excuse about coffees?”

It’s cute how Sam’s so nervous, and Alex finds herself actually liking the idea of going out with her. That’s how she finds herself saying, “Yes, I suppose you could.”

Sam smiles a radiant one, nodding. “Yeah, I suppose I will, then.”

“Good.”

Sam heads to door. “I think I should get going. Thanks for the evening, your friends are very nice.”

“Don’t tell them this, though,” Alex says. “It will get to their heads.”

Standing outside the apartment, they share one last look before Sam leans down, placing a delicate kiss against Alex’s cheek. “Goodnight.”

Watching Sam’s retreating form go down the stairs, Alex sighs. “Goodnight.”

-

On Saturday, the six of them gather together in the theater district of National City to watch Winn’s newest play, Freud!

In the off-broadway venue, Kara, Alex, James, Lena and Sam squeeze together on the front row, reading through their little pamphlets, and Kara ends up sitting in the aisle, right next to Lena.

Kara watches Lena flip through the play’s program, an excited smile sitting in her lips. “Oh, look, here’s Winn’s picture,” she exclaims.

“This is so exciting,” Sam says, looking around amazedly.

James is sitting on the corner opposite to Kara’s, and he leans forward to find her eyes. “You can alway spot someone who’s never seen his plays before. Notice, no fear, no sense of impending doom.”

“Honestly, the exclamation in the title seems a bit too much,” Alex chimes in, gesturing with her hands. “It’s not just Freud, it’s Freud!”

The lights dim, and Kara points to Sam and Lena, saying, “You’re about to see some magic.”

As Kara expected, it goes horribly. Winn’s true talent seems to be finding the most ridiculous plays in Nacional City and finding a way to star in them. This one actually started kind of nice, but it soon spiralled into a musical show about mother and fathers, boobs and dingles. Winn is for sure a charismatic lead, but not even he can save this disaster.

As soon as the play ends, they all stand up, applauding as if this is a Tony worthy piece. Kara even has to nudge Alex awake, and she jumps with the clapping noise. However, when the cast finally leaves the stage, the five of them groan and sigh, flopping down heavily in their chairs.

Sam has a hand against her chest. “God, I feel violated.”

“Did anybody else felt like they wanted to pull their skin off her body just to have something to do?” Lena asks, biting her nails.

Winn comes jumping from behind a curtain, smiling and still with his outfit, hair tamed down with more gel than Kara’s ever seen in her life. They all start cheering and screaming at him, speaking one over the other in a way it’s impossible to understand what they’re saying.

“So, what do you guys think?” he asks, hopeful.

Unsure of how to say anything without breaking his heart, they all start yelling again. “I didn’t know you could dance! You had a beard! You’re in a play.”

Winn’s shoulders slum down, and he looks at them with skepticism. “C’mon, guys, it wasn’t that bad.”

Sam reaches out to touch his arm. “I’ve known you for a week, and after this I don’t want to be your friend anymore.”

They all share a laugh when Winn sends Sam a dirty look, and Kara watches a woman with dark hair approach, still dressed with the outfits worn in the play.

She taps Winn on the shoulder, handing him a piece of paper and explaining a man handed out a bunch of card to the actors on the dressing rooms.

Winn scans over the paper quickly. “The J’onn J’onzz Talent Agency. Wow, an agency left me their card!” he exclaims. “Maybe they wanna sign me.”

James frowns. “Based on this play?” he asks, but chances his demeanor when everyone turns to stare at him. “Hey, based on this play!”

-

They decide to walk home from the theater, stopping by a pizza shop to buy some pepperoni slices to eat on the way. The air is still crisp with the remaining chill from winter, but James feels like the grease on his fingers help him stay warm.

The laughter and the company do too.

They’re nearing Kara’s apartment complex, and James needs to borrow some cooking books from Lena, wants to try a new recipe of shrimp. Their voices echo in the empty streets of dawn, and James almost rolls his eyes when they start on a conversation about the importance of kissing in a relationship.

“What you guys don’t understand is that, for us, kissing is as important as any part of it,” Lena explains.

The warmth of the inside of the building hugs them, and James frowns. “Really?”

Kara hums. “Absolutely.”

“Everything you need to know is in a kiss,” Sam chimes in.

The sign saying the elevator is broken remains there even after two weeks, so they decide to take the stairs.

“I think, for us, kissing is more like an opening act, you know?” James says, going up to steps at time. “I mean, it’s like the stand up comedian you have to sit through before Pink Floyd comes out.”

“It’s not that we don’t like the comedian,” Winn adds as they reach the third floor. “It’s just - It’s not why we bought the ticket.”

“And after the concert’s over, no matter how great the show was, you guys are always looking for the comedian again, y’know?” James shrugs. “I mean, we’re in the car, fighting traffic, basically just trying to stay awake, really.”

They reach Kara and Winn’s floor, and Alex has a cheeky grin when she says, “Word of advice: bring back the comedian. Otherwise you’ll be trying to find the other side of the moon all by yourself.”

The girls share a condensating laugh, and James would actually bother to answer if his heart didn’t make a full stop: sitting on the floor against Kara’s door, flipping lazy through a women’s magazine, it’s Lucy.

She stands abruptly when they arrive, and James needs to take a minute to just look at her, understand her presence is real and physical. Lucy still looks the same way she did about a month ago, the last time James saw her, moving out of the house the rest of her belongings. Her hair is still short, curling around her neck, but she looks younger, happier, more like the girl James fell in love with almost 7 years before.

He’s suddenly very unable to breathe, and almost feels like the bones in his nose haven’t quite healed yet.

Lucy scans all of their faces, somewhat shy. “Kara, Winn, Alex. Nice to see you.”

Sam and Lena introduce themselves, but all of this exchange sounds like white noise to James’ ears. He listens to nothing but a buzz, and that only stops when Lucy says his name, soft and hesitant.

He snaps from his trance. “Hi. You - you look great. I hate that.”

Lucy opens and closes her mouth, and it reminds him of a blowfish. “Sorry. You look good too.”

“Thanks.” He nods too quickly and, seriously, blood is so close from dripping down his nose. “So, what’s new? You’re still, hum…”

“A lesbian?” Lucy completes, arching a brow.

He shrugs. “You never know.”

James only seems to remind himself of the existence of his friends when Winn chimes in in the whole awkward ordeal, pointing to Kara’s place. “Why don’t we give you guys some privacy, huh?”

“No no no,” Lucy urges. “I have something to tell and I think you all should be here.”

“Are you breaking up with us?” Sam asks right from the back, but, seriously, nobody laughs.

James looks intently at his ex-wife while she busies herself with her nails, avoiding looking up. “Actually, um, I’m pregnant.”

Time stands very still for a couple of seconds, and James is sure he heard wrong. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah, and you’re the father,” Lucy adds, grimacing. A headache starts bursting from his temples, and he takes his hands to his face. “But it’s totally up to you if you wanna be involved or not, but Susan and I would really like if you were part of it but if you feel too uncomfortable with it you don’t have to, really.”

James really needs Lucy to shut up for a second, just for a moment, just so he can think about anything beyond the thousand images of babies swimming in his gray matter. A father, he’s gonna be a father.

“Of course I wanna be involved,” he quickly assures her. “It’s very sudden, but it’s - it’s my baby, I’m the father.”

“You are,” Lucy agrees.

The air slowly comes back to his lungs, and the metal taste on his mouth feels finally gone. He turns to his friends, and they look as shocked as he feels, waiting for him to say something. “I’m the father,” he repeats, a smile growing on his mouth. “I’m the father! You guys, I’m the father.”

“You are,” Kara repeats, grinning.

“I’m the father,” he exclaims, and his friends explode in noise, hugging him, congratulating him and Lucy.

James’ still can’t believe it, can’t wrap his mind around that fact, but he being a dad - it feels rightful, tangible, natural.

He wraps Lucy in a hug, feeling the soft scent emanate from her hair. James remembers the last time they slept together, about a month before Lucy moved out, in a frivolous attempt to rekindle the love they felt for each other. Of course Lucy was already seeing Susan then, but James feels good knowing that, in spite of that, their last night still managed to create something beautiful.

“Thank you, thank you,” he whispers in Lucy’s ear, and she holds him tighter.

When they part, they’re both misty-eyed, wiping almost-there tears from their eyes. “Well, I need to get going,” Lucy says, fishing for a tape in her bag and giving him. “Susan and I went for a sonogram a couple days ago, and, um, this is the video. Of the baby.”

James cradles it against his chest like the most precious thing he’s ever touched, and, really, wow, he’s gonna be a dad. “There’s another one in about two weeks, if you’d like to come,” she says.

“I would,” James assures her, and Lucy gives a tiny smile, almost like she thought he’d bail out on her, like he wouldn’t wanna be there for them.

“Okay, give me a call, yeah? I’ll send you the address, everything.” He nods, reaching for her hand. She wraps him in a last hug, in a very Lucy-way: she’s too short, so she always ends up holding his ears, standing in the tips of her toes. “I should go now,” she says, quickly bidding farewell to his friends.

James watches as she leaves. Somehow, he loves even more than he did 10 minutes ago, but it already feels like a different type of love. Romantic, yes, always romantic, but restrained in some way, the type of love felt between two exes who break up and have to share custody of a cat, except, this time, it’s a child.

Jesus Christ, James is gonna be a father.

He feels Kara’s hands in his shoulders. “C’mon, big guy. Let’s watch this tape.”

James gets up in a hurry, and they’re in front of Kara and Alex’s TV in no time. He can’t quite figure out what’s on the video, a blurry mess of whites and blacks, but he does identify one little lump in the middle of it, and his heart beats faster with the knowledge that that is his child.

“Um, what are we supposed to be seeing here?” Sam asks, squinting.

“I dunno, but I feel like it’s about to attack the Enterprise,” Winn answers.

Alex tilts her head. “You know, if you move your head to the left and relax your eyes, it kinda looks like an old potato.”

“Maybe let’s not do that,” Lena says, and that’s all before they all decide to go to bed.

Kara and Alex let him crash there for the night, and he camps on their couch, replaying the 3-minute video over and over again. James can’t sleep, marvelled by the miracle of life unfolding right before his eyes, and it’s much later before he drifts into slumber, lulled by the warmth of the early morning and his child’s watchful figure.

-

Sam is sure the best decision she made in her five months of living in Nacional City was rekindling with Alex Danvers and befriending her group of friends. They’re such a genuine bunch of people, very funny, very familiar-like, and, besides, Sam gets to go to Kara’s apartment almost every night and have the guarantee that there’s food waiting for her, crafted by the magical hands of Lena Luthor.

Tonight, after they all filled their stomachs with some delicious chicken macaroni, and Sam is so full she feels like having a nap, Winn inquires what are their plans for the evening.

“I don’t have any plans,” Kara says. “Just have to go deliver some papers by the office.”

“Really, no plans?” James inquires, quirking an eyebrow, and Sam learned soon that James is like the guru of the group, knows everything about everyone. “Not even, say, breaking up with Mon-El?”

He uses the annoying nickname they gave to Kara’s equally annoying on again-off again boyfriend Mike, whose perhaps worst trait was the nasally voice he acquired after getting a nose job, and his insistent use of the phrase “Oh my god”. Sam has only had the displeasure of meeting him once and, honestly, that was enough.

(Also, she was half certain he was Jewish too, and for sure there’s some religious rule about not saying God’s name in vain. Honestly, he repeated that sentence so much he might as well be out of Heaven right now.)

Kara rolls her eyes. “Oh, yeah, yeah, shut up.”

“You gotta end with him once and for all someday, Little Danvers,” Sam says, adding her two cents. She gets up to browse through the refrigerator, see if there’s any pudding left from three days ago.

“And please do it before the holidays,” Alex adds. “You know how people get around that time of the year, all clingy and dependent.”

“We’re in June,” Kara deadpans.

Her sister shrugs, and Sam has to bite her lip to avoid laughing. “Just sayin’.”

The friends start gathering the used dishes and placing them in the sink. Today is Sam’s turn to wash them, and she’s glad washing the dishes is an activity she likes, one that allows her to organize what she has to do, or even to come up with new plots for her books.

Lena silently approaches Kara while she puts away the orange juice. “Hey, if you’re going to drop by the office, could you give me a ride to work tonight?”

Sam can’t see the interaction, and it kills her when Kara is silent for a few milliseconds. “Yeah, sure. I’d love to.”

A smile is perceptible in Lena’s voice when she says, “Thank you.”

Sam has noticed through the weeks that Lena isn’t as close to Kara as she is with the other three, so she figures some time alone might do good for their bonding. Sam is a curious person, though, and she’d kill to know the reason why the two of them seem much closer to Alex, James and Winn.

She can’t dwell on it too much, though, because Winn is already announcing his plans. Sam figures a kidnapper would make good money if they ever took one of her friends, they’re always telling everyone what they’re doing, and where and with whom. “I have rehearsals for the play later.”

“Maybe we could split a cab,” James says. “Lucy’s doctor’s appointment is in the same area.”

Sam lets the chatter around her escape from her ears as soon as Alex approaches the sink, drying the dishes and putting them in their respective cabinets.

Sam’s been marvelling for weeks now how different Alex looks from the time they went to high school. She still walks with her chin high and the sort of attitude that says she’ll take shit from no one, but now it feels like her confidence is real, and it comes from a place of really being comfortable with who you are.

“So, Alex, what are you doing tonight?” she asks.

“Oh, you know, big glamour night tonight,” Alex answers, separating the knives, forks and spoons. “Me and my clothes are gonna meet the building’s laundry.”

Sam grimaces in sympathy. “That can’t be nice.”

“Yeah, it isn’t.” Alex hums. “Kara would actually come with me but this thing came up in the magazine and I guess she can’t make it.”

Sam swears it’s the way Alex’s eyes shine in the intimate space they share in the kitchen, and the way some wild strands of hair scape from her bun to her forehead, and the way René Magritte’s painting looks so good in her skin. All these things combined are what make Sam ultimately say, “I’ll go with you.”

Alex doesn’t even lift her head from organizing the silverware. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Sam’s voice feels weird all of the sudden. “I have to get used to using the building’s laundry anyway.”

“I actually never went to a wash house before,” Alex confesses. “Kara was handling my dirty clothes during these past few months.”

“Oh, wow. I guess you have a lot to hear, huh? Say seven-ish? We’ll meet downstairs.”

When Alex says “Sure”, and resumes doing what she was doing before, Sam can already feel the engines in her mind speeding up.

-

For a thursday night, Alex notes the laundromat is really crowded. Kara’s building is an old one - she actually inherited the apartment from her biological mother’s grandma - and there’s no space inside the apartment to actually set up a washing space, so most of the residents opt for using the wash house offered by the building instead of spending their money in expensive laundry shops.

Alex has placed her dirty basket on top of a washing machine, and she’s leaning against a wall, observing the unfamiliar faces until Sam arrives.

The relative peace of the place is disturbed when a very short woman with a scrubby face comes in. “Comin’ through. Move, move.” The woman completely ignores Alex’s basket on top of the machine, and starts loading it with her stuff.

Alex isn’t sure what to do in a situation like this, so she decides to come forward. “Um, excuse me, I was kinda using that machine.”

The woman looks her up and down, scorn in her lips. “Well, now you’re kinda not.”

Alex doesn’t let go. “But I saved it. I put my basket on top of it.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, is that your basket? It’s so pretty.” She immediately knows the woman is being purposefully mean, because there’s nothing pretty about her 3-dollar gray basket. “Sadly, I don’t see any detergent.”

“What?”

The woman continues putting her things inside of the washing machine. “No detergent, no save.”

When Sam arrives five minutes later, Alex has her basket in front of her feet, staring with range at the woman’s moving form.

Sam immediately notices her frown. “Is everything ok?”

“Yeah, it’s just,” Alex huffs. “That nasty woman just took my machine.”

“Was your basket on top?” Sam asks, sparing a quick glance at Nasty Lady.

Alex nods. “Yeah, but there was no detergent.”

“What?”

“You know, no detergent, no save,” Alex explains, using the same logic Nasty Lady had just used with her. Honestly, Alex was new to this sort of thing, and couldn’t tell what was plausible from what wasn’t, but, judging from Sam’s deep look of disdain, she was probably being tricked.

Sam raises a finger. “Hold on a second.” With the same finger, she reaches out to the woman, tapping her repeatedly on the shoulder. “That’s my friend’s machine.”

The woman scowls. “Her stuff wasn’t in it.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Sam calls when Nasty Lady starts turning around. Alex has a hard time focusing on anything else other than Sam’s face. “That’s not the rule and you know it.”

Sam and Nasty Lady seem to hold a staring machine for a few seconds, until the lady huffs and moves to take her stuff out of the machine, sparing them a hard look as she looks for another one.

The hardness of Sam’s face falls as she turns back to Alex, cheerfully saying, “Okay, let’s get this show on the road.”

Sam borrows her some detergent - Snuggles, and Alex has to admit it’s super cute - so she starts loading her dirty laundry into the machines, filling it with with hoodies and jeans and blouses.

“Alex, uh,” Sam calls. “Aren’t you going to separate those?”

Her hands stop and Alex looks up to her friend. “Was I supposed to put shirts in one machine and pants in the other?”

Sam sends her an earnest look, and Alex’s face burns. “You really never done this before, have you?”

“Not me, no,” she answers sheepish. “My mom always took care of it when I lived with her, and when I went to college. Maxwell had maids to do it. And I guess Kara feels bad for me so she’s been doing all kinds of stuff to make my life easier. So I guess I’m a - a laundry virgin, you could say.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll use the gentle circle.” Her and Sam share a laugh, and, really Alex, nice choice of words you got going on, buddy. “Basically, you wanna use one machine for your whites, one for your coloreds, and a third for your delicates. You know, bras and underwear and such.”

Sam finds an available machine for herself a few ones down from Alex’s, so they work in silence while the conversations of the other residents are drowned out by the noise coming from the washing machines. In no time, Alex manages to separate her all her clothes and find them places to be cleaned.

There’s some weird satisfaction in seeing the soapy water twirling inside the washing machine, and Alex feels oddly proud of herself, even if washing clothes is something so simple and mundane.

Every step is important. Going back to work, arranging her room in Kara’s apartment, baking a cake, washing clothes: if Alex can do these things, there’s nothing stopping her from doing anything else.

She shares this with Sam when they’re both waiting for their clothes to be done. In response, Sam whips out her iPod and starts searching for a song.

“Hold on,” she says, laughing, everytime Alex curiously inquiries what song she’s looking for. “You’ll like it.”

A melodic guitar starts playing, and soon a slow, almost bored voice starts filling the blanks. Sam turns the iPod to her, and Girl Named Alex by Kurt Vile flashes on the screen.

It feels very intimate, sitting beside Sam while a song talking about wanting to live in a fantasy is used as their personal soundtrack. The noises made by the tossing and turning of the machines seem farther away as the warmth of Sam’s brown eyes comes even closer, and the singer says he wants to walk into the night.

The buzzer on Alex’s washer signals the clothes are done, and Sam gets up with Alex, looking like she missed a chance.

“Let’s see,” Sam says, moving to open the washer. The smile she had adorned on her face falls. “Uh, oh.”

Alex frowns. “What uh-oh?”

Sam closes the lid quickly, not letting her see the inside. “It’s a song for when you wash your clothes. Uh-oh, the laundry’s done, uh-oh.”

“Sam, what’s the matter?” she asks, growing impatient.

“Nothing, nothing. Uh-oh, the laundry’s done.”

“Come on, show me.”

Sam sighs, beckoning her to come closer. “Alright, it’s just - you left a red sock in with all your whites and now everything’s kinda - pink.”

Alex takes a peek inside the machine, and it looks like Legally Blonde threw up on her clothes. Oh God, Alex feels like throwing up herself. “Shit, everything’s pink.”

“Except for the red sock, which is still red,” Sam stammers out. “I’m sorry, please don’t be upset, it could’ve happened to everyone.”

Rage takes over Alex’s body, and she starts angrily unloading the machine, throwing her now pink clothes into a basket. Sam, sensing is better to leave her alone for a second, leaves to grab a cart.

Of course stuff like this were meant to happen with Alex. Of fucking course. This kind of stuff only served to prove the initial point she made almost six months ago: she had no business throwing herself into the world like this, had no business trying to fit into a life she clearly didn’t belong. Maybe she should’ve married Maxwell, lived a rich and unhappy life with him, had a couple of children and, in her elderly days, she could be part of a book club or accept the consequences of her impending alcoholism. She’d watched Grace and Frankie after all. Call her Jane Fonda.

“You got the clothes clean, that’s what matters,” Sam says when she starts helping Alex take the rest of her clothes out of the machines. Every single one of them is still in their original color, and that’s a relief.

Alex shrugs. “I guess. But everything looks like pijamas now.”

Nasty Lady approaches, as if to mock Alex’s situation, but instead she ignores their existence completely, moving to grab the cart Sam brought.

“Um, excuse me,” Alex calls. “We had this cart.”

Nasty Lady looks down on her. “Yeah, well, I had a 24-inch waist. You lose things. Now get outta my way.

Alex spares a quick glance to Sam, who motions her to get the cart back. “I’m sorry, maybe I wasn’t being clear. This is our cart.”

“There weren’t any clothes in it,” the lady says.

“Hey, quit making up rules,” Alex says, finally exploding.

Nasty Lady pulls the car in her direction. “Let go!”

Even though she feels very childish, Alex starts pulling the cart in her direction, and, for an outsider, it’d look like they’re fighting for something much more important. Nasty Lady has a strong grip in the cart, and they struggle a little in the thankfully empty laundromat, so Alex, in a last desperate attempt, decides to climb inside the cart.

She points a finger to the lady. “Listen here, woman. If you want this cart, you’re gonna have to take me with it.”

Nasty Lady takes one long look at her, and lets go of the cart, pushing it away. Sam grabs the cart, spinning it around while Alex’s still inside of it, and an enormous feeling of relief and accomplishment fills Alex’s body, her heart pounds heavily and she hasn’t been this happy in a long time.

Maybe she can do this after all. Fuck these pink clothes.

“Did you see that?” Alex asks matter of factly, smiling brightly at Sam.

She nods. “Yes, yes. Wow, you were incredible. Brand new woman, ladies and gentleman.”

Alex grabs Sam’s arms “I couldn't have done it without you.”

In a moment of blindness, Alex reaches out grasp Sam’s neck, kissing her on the mouth without hesitation. Sam’s lips taste oddly like honey, and she doesn’t move while Alex presses their lips together.

As soon as she realises what she’s done, Alex quickly lets go of Sam, taking a hand to her lips. God, she was drunk in happiness, so wasted she might as well have ruined the tentative friendship she was building with Sam.

Her friend has her eyes wide, breathing in short gasps. “Um, let’s grab the rest of the clothes, yeah?” Sam turns sharply, colliding with the open door of one of the machines.

“Are you okay?” Alex asks, trying to climb out of the cart.

She notices, as soon as Sam answers “No”, that her friends lips still look colored from her own lipstick.

-

Kara taking Lena to work becomes sort of a routine.

Most of the days of the week, Kara, being the head editor of her section at the magazine, has to run back to the office and fix some impending problem, or give the approval on some article soon to be released. On these nights, Kara makes sure to wait a few more minutes, waiting for Lena on the building’s entrance so they can go together.

If Lena’s being honest, she hadn’t quite become as close to Kara as she has with the rest of her friends. The blonde woman is nice and welcoming, and certainly pretty - which makes everything easier -, but something always holds Lena back when it comes to bonding with the youngest Danvers.

However, when they started this whole carpooling thing, she couldn’t help but grow closer to Kara at each ride, and, right now, Lena can’t even remember what is was that stopped them from being friends. Maybe the way Kara’s blue eyes always shone differently when she’d look at Lena, but maybe that’s a stretch, who knows?

Kara has a Toyota Echo, and even if one of their recurring jokes is that she looks like a soccer mom, Lena has to admit the car is incredibly comfortable, especially if you’re going to spend long periods of the ride in traffic.

But Kara knows the city well, finding little shortcuts in places Lena would never think twice to go.

“How long have you been living in the city?” Lena asks, as Kara takes a sharp turn to the left.

“Um, just about 7 years? I moved here for college,” she explains. “And ended up staying. I had the apartment, after all.”

They stop by a traffic light. “I always wondered how you managed to have that good apartment in such a good spot on the city.”

“Nobody never told you?” Kara inquiries, and Lena shakes her head. She didn’t know there was anything to be told. “My biological grandma let me inherit it when she passed.”

Before Lena even opens her mouth, the light goes down around them, and darkness incompasses the entire street. The cars line up in front of the dark traffic lights, being the only source of illumination on the street. It’s funny to look around and see National City without its usual lights and brightness, and Lena thinks it feels almost wrong.

“Shit,” Kara mutters, fishing for her phone. “Looks like the power went out.”

“What do we do now?” Lena asks.

Kara shrugs. “Looks like we could be here for a while.” She reclines against her leather seat, making herself comfortable. “I think you should text your boss, say you’re gonna be late.”

When Lena finishes sending a message to the sous-chef saying she doesn’t think she’ll make it - and the sous confirm the blackout stretched all the way across the city, and says that maybe the restaurant won’t even be opened for the night shift -, Lena notices Kara lying down on her seat, eyes closed and arms under her head. Most of the people has got out of their cars, begrudgingly chatting in a metropolitan-like manner, but not Kara Danvers.

Her friend looks like she’s laying on the grass in the middle of Central Park, and only then Lena notices the soft music playing on the background. The air conditioner still works, but the October air surrounding them is enough to make the atmosphere chilly.

A song about using somebody filters through the speakers, and Lena asks, “What do you mean your biological grandma?”

Kara opens one single eye, sending her a sideline glance. “I was adopted by the Danvers when I was 9.”

“I didn’t know that,” Lena says, feeling oddly excluded. Like she should already know such an important aspect of Kara’s life. That feeling leaves her breathless.

Kara turns on the side, supporting her head with one arm. “Not many people know. Anyway, my mom’s mom died a couple years ago, and left me the place. I didn’t even know she lived here, to be honest.”

There’s an open honesty shining in Kara’s eyes, and Lena doesn’t know if it’s the intimate space they’re sharing in the dark interior of the car or if it’s the relief of not having to got to work again.

“Why couldn’t she keep you?” Lena asks. “If you don’t mind me asking.”

Kara waves a hand. “It’s alright,” she says. “She was, um, already really old when my parents died. She visited me in Midvale all the time anyway. I was kinda surprised to see she survived another 13 years,” she confesses, sheepish.

Lena chuckles lightly. “How did they die?”

“Drunk driver,” Kara answers simply, clicking her tongue. It suddenly makes a lot more sense the way she always seems tense while driving, hands gripping the steering wheel with enough force to bruise, head always moving from one side to another like she can hear and feel everything from a mile away.

Lena feels like hugging her friend.

The mood turns a little uncomfortable for a second, so Lena decides to change the subject for something lighter. “Wanna play the Alphabet Game?” is the only thing she can think to say.

It seems like the right thing to say, because Kara jumps on her seat, pointing to a sticker in a nearby car and shouting, “Armadillo!”

-

Sam watches the contours of the city from Alex and Kara’s kitchen window. The moon shines like a mirror, washing the streets with brightness, and they’re lucky one of the billboards in front of their apartment still shines, illuminating them a little more than the other buildings. The blue colors of Pepsi stretches in the furniture inside of the apartment.

Sam thinks this is kind of cool, and makes a mental note to use this scenario in one of her novels.

“Kara just called me,” Winn shouts. “She says it’s all over the city, she and Lena got stuck in traffic.”

Alex strides out of her room with a Menorah in hand, all 9 candles lit.

“Officiating tonight’s blackout, Rabbi Alex Danvers,” James ironizes.

Alex rolls her eyes, placing the Menorah in the center table, moving away the books and magazines. “That’s all Kara has. Happy early-Hanukkah, everyone.”

Chuckling, Sam turns back to the window, grimacing immediately. “Ew, guys. Ugly Naked Guy lit a bunch of candles.”

Her three friends approach, staring at their neighbor in utter disgust. Sam’s body physically hurts when a woman approaches Ugly Naked Guy, and they start sensually making out, if you could call any of that sensual.

“Looks like he’s got company,” Winn says in a funnily exaggerated voice.

Sam has half a mind to turn away, let those ugly naked folks have their fun in the dark, but she can only watch as Ugly Naked Guy gets too close to one of the candles, burning his ass with the movement.

They all flinch, and Alex hides behind her. “That hurt,” she says, aware of the euphemism.

The 4 of them move to sit on the couches. “What’s the weirdest place you guys had sex?” Winn asks.

“Wow, take us to dinner first,” James says, clutching his hand to his chest.

“Shut up,” Winn garbles. “I’ll go first. The women’s room on the second floor of the National City public library.”

“Oh my God? What were you doing in a library?” Sam ironizes, and they all laugh while Winn sends her a dirty look. “Mine is a pool table. Senior year of college.”

Alex comes back with coffee for all of them, asking, “James, what about you?”

James pauses to think for a second, a smirk gracing his lips, but all Sam can pay attention is the way Alex presses against her on the couch, even if there’s much more space on the other side. “Disneyland, 2015, ‘It’s a Small World After All’.”

“No way, nah, I don’t believe you,” they all shout in unison.

“The ride broke down, so Lucy and I went behind one of those castles. Then the ride was fixed and they kindly asked us to never return to the Magic Kingdom.”

“Now you go, Alex,” Winn urges.

She grimaces, and Sam can’t stop looking at the shadows on her face made by the candle lights. “The weirdest place would have to be - the foot of a bed.”

“Step back,” James mocks.

Winn raises his arms. “We have a winner here.”

James retreats to the balcony when Lucy calls, and Winn lays down on the couch to read through his newest script, one Sam isn’t even sure what it talks about, something regarding surgeons and evil twins or whatever. Alex gets up to take their beer bottles to the sink, and Sam follows quietly beside her. The light of the Menorah is almost enough to pretend as if there isn’t a blackout after all.

“Is it true?” she asks, while Alex loads the trash can. “What you said about the foot of the bed?”

Alex nods, unable to meet her eyes. “I just never had a relationship with that kind of passion, you know, where you gotta have someone right there, in the middle of a theme park.”

Sam smirks. “Well, in their defense, it’s the only thing you can do without having to wait in line.”

“There, well, see?” Alex says, moving to sit on the table, facing Sam. “Maxwell wouldn’t even kiss me on a miniature golf course.”

“Come on,” Sam says disbelieving, squinting her eyes at the woman.

Her friend nods. “No, he said we were holding up the people behind us.”

“And you didn’t marry him because?” Sam asks ironically, and they share a small laugh. She thinks Alex looks her best like this, in the comfort of her own home, not being troubled by the pressure of the world around her, confident enough to just be who she is and say what she wants.

It’s been a three weeks since they kissed, and they never talked about it, but just by thinking about it again makes fire spark in Sam’s veins, urging he to grab Alex and kiss her again.

But she knows she can’t. The escape from the wedding is still something that haunts Alex everyday, and Sam couldn’t reach risking their friendship if she wasn’t sure Alex was a hundred percent ready. And, well, she wasn’t. At least not yet.

“I mean, do you think there are people who go through life never having that kind of passion?” Alex inquires when the silence stretches thin around them, and somehow Sam knows she’s also thinking about the kiss.

“Probably,” Sam answers, mouth dry. “But, you know, I’ll tell you something. Passion is overrated.”

Alex squints, getting up to lit more candles across the room. “Yeah, right.”

“No, seriously,” Sam insists, moving together everywhere Alex goes. “Eventually, it kind of - burns out. But hopefully what you’re left with is trust, and security, and, well, in the case of James’s wife, lesbianism. So, you know, for all those people who miss out on passion there’s always the other good stuff.”

Alex places a few candles on the table by the window, turning around to stand side by side with sam. Their arms lightly brush. “Okay,” she sighs.

“But, you know,” Sam hurries, clearing her throat. “I don’t think that’s gonna be you.”

Alex turns to her. “You don’t?”

“I see big passion in your future,” Sam says, smiling in a secretive way she hopes Alex understands.

“Really?”

Sam nods. “Mmmm.”

“You do?” Alex repeats, the shadows reflecting on her brown eyes.

“I do,” Sam insists, and she swears she could kiss Alex right there.

“You’re so great, Sam,” Alex says, leaning to give her a kiss on the cheek, retreating to her room right after.

Sam bites her lips, watching as Alex goes away, feeling the ghost of her lips linger on her cheek, the soft scent of her perfume circle around her mind.

She almost jumps when she realises Winn’s presence right by her side. “It’s never gonna happen?”

“What?” she asks, flustered.

“You and Alex,” he deadpans, holding his script.

“What?” Sam asks, voice going high, trying to pretend she doesn’t know what he’s talking about. She clearly fails, so she inquires, “Why not?”

“Because you waited too long to make a move, now you’re in the friendzone,” he answers, moving his hands exaggeratedly as if he’s uncovering one of the world’s biggest secrets.

Sam scoffs. “What? No, I’m not in the zone.”

Winn sends her a furtive glance. “You’re like the mayor of the zone.”

“I’m taking my time, alright?” she insists. “I’m laying the groundwork. Everyday, I get a little bit closer to -”

“Becoming a virgin again!” Winn interrupts. “I’m telling you, she has no idea what you’re thinking. Trust me, I know Alex. If you don’t actually ask her out soon, you’re gonna be in the zone forever.”

“I will, I will. I’m just waiting for the right moment.” Her friends sends her a look, opening her arms. “What, now?”

“I’m sorry, what’s messing you up? Is it the candles, the alcohol, the moonlight?” he numerates. “You just gotta go up to her and say, ‘Alex, I wanna take you out’.”

Sam closes her eyes, the different sides of her brain arguing that Winn has some good points, but that he’s plan could ultimately fail.

“No, I’m gonna keep doing what I’m doing,” Sam insists.

Winn shrugs. “I’m just telling ya. But don’t say I didn’t warn you, ok?”

He goes back to his script, throwing himself on the couch. The candles still burn brightly, the billboard still shines blue light into the apartment, but the air feels a little sticky, more uncomfortable and, damn, Winn’s got her thinking.

-

“And... zebra striped dress,” Kara says, pointing to a woman waiting by the sideline. “Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever finished an Alphabet Game before.”

The blackout’s still going on around the neighborhood Kara and Lena got stuck. After almost two hours, the group of people jammed in the traffic became almost a village. There’s people selling food and water, folks chatting idly in the sidewalks, and, if Kara really pays attention, she can hear a bunch of teenagers mastering their on redemption of Wonderwall a couple cars down.

Really, a village

Lena whistles. “I’m impressed, Danvers, really.”

Kara fake-bows, sending a smile in her friends’ direction. “One of my many talents, thank you.”

Inside of her own car, another Oasis song comes up, courtesy of Alex’s very own Spotify playlist, but Kara has stopped paying attention to the music selection a long time ago, instead focusing on the way a few wild strands of hair escape from Lena’s messy bun, and how she looks tired yet so pretty.

Kara is in a trance, and can only follow the movement Lena does when she bites her lip. “You know,” she starts, and Kara finds her eyes. “I was adopted too.”

Kara widens her eyes. “I didn’t know,” she says softly, repeating the words Lena said before.

Her friend nods. “Yeah, I was 4,” she explains. “Don’t remember much about my biological mom.”

“What about your dad?” Kara inquiries, but Lena scowls.

“Yeah, my dad is my dad,” she says, scorn on her lips. “He cheated on his wife and I was born.”

“And his wife adopted you anyway? Whew,” Kara exclaims, and then realises she sounded kind of like a dickhead. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to -”

“It’s okay,” Lena dismisses with a wave of her hand. “I’m not even sure she knows. But Lilian raised me well. You know, a little judgmental and pushy, but, you know, a mom’s gotta do what a mom’s gotta do.”

Kara sends her a sad smile. “Hey, at least we match, right?” Lena sends her a frown. “Two adopted girls, just trying to grab the world by its tail.”

Lena stares her right in the eyes, and Kara had never understood that saying about the eyes being the window to someone’s soul until now, when Lena’s green eyes expose so much sadness, grief and desire to change her past.

She bites her lip again. “Yeah, we do match.”

Only then Kara realises the utter intimacy of their actions throughout the entire night, and how misguided that situation was.

Staying inside the car when everyone left theirs, as if they were girlfriends sharing stories about their personal lives, listening to a playlist Alex had named “old-school love”, that’s their first mistake. Indeed sharing anecdotes about their personal lives, playing games as if they’re high school girls in a roadtrip across America trying to find themselves, mistake number two. Kara wanting desperately to swing Lena into her arms, kiss her head and tell her everything’s gonna be fine, mistake number three.

Kara’s vision blurs in the dark, and she can’t see anything besides Lena’s shining hopeful eyes. “Listen, Lena - “

All the lights come back together suddenly, illuminating everything around them. Her eyes hurt and she closes them, not even knowing what she was going to say, but knowing it would be something stupid, made to ruin their still-fresh friendship.

Lena must notice her intentions, because she sits upright, clearing her throat. “Well, I guess we better go back to the apartment,” she says as the cars start to scatter around them.

Speechless, Kara can only nod, pressing her wheel to the engine firmly, not looking once to Lena’s face while they ride back to their building, not knowing exactly what the hell just happened with her during this blackout.