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Kara kisses Lena on a Tuesday.
In the aftermath, Lena will wonder if there was anything special about that specific Tuesday – if something happened that could have forewarned her that she would know what Kara’s lips felt like on hers before the sun set on it. And try as she might, she won’t be able to think of a single thing, because there wasn’t anything special about that Tuesday.
The day started out below average, actually. Her first morning meeting started late, and then Maxwell Lord had the audacity to propose a partnership between their companies – as if L-Corp hadn’t stopped any and all weapons developing and manufacturing the very second Lena took over. She knew he knew that, there were many articles about it (the best one, of course, written by one Kara Danvers), and she didn’t appreciate having her time wasted. It sets her whole day behind and she’s frustrated about it for most of the morning.
Her late start is the excuse she gives Kara for why she’s still at her desk when her friend arrives slightly late for lunch – a lunch she may or may not have forgotten about – with Big Belly Burger. (Which is when the day moves from average to good, because any day including even a moment of Kara smiling at her like that can’t be anything but pure good.)
Kara carefully lays out the food on the coffee table while Lena finishes up, and wraps her in the warmest of hugs before they sit down, and while it’s all undeniably nice, it’s still just a normal Tuesday. They’re eating together, and after Kara tells her about the robbery she stopped that morning – “They all know the bullets won’t work, and yet they keep shooting, I don’t get it!” – she starts telling Kara about the new prototype of her nanotechnology that she finally got working the night before. Kara predictably chastises her for working until four in the morning (again), but then she asks about the implications and Lena just – Lena maybe goes on a little bit of a rant about all the good she’ll be able to do once this technology is up and running. Every time she thinks she’s said everything she looks at Kara’s delighted face and another thing pops into her mind, and she probably would have kept talking forever if Kara hadn’t shut her up with a kiss.
That is, she’s talking, and everything’s normal, and suddenly there’s a soft warm hand on her neck and a thumb stroking borderline lovingly across her cheekbone and Kara has the softest look in her eyes and is she closer? She’s definitely closer – and then Kara’s lips are on hers and Lena’s whole entire world stops.
It just – stops. For a second.
The next moment there’s a telltale whoosh and Kara’s gone. Honestly, Lena would have doubted the whole thing even happened if it wasn’t for the warmth of Kara’s hand still on the back of her neck, and the feeling of Kara’s lips that she’s going to be playing over and over in her head for the rest of her life.
Did Kara really just kiss her? During lunch on a random Tuesday? Did Kara really just kiss her senseless during lunch between friends on a random Tuesday and then literally fly away?
What the fuck?
***
Kara successfully avoids her for three days. It’s kind of unfair really, that Kara can just say she heard sirens and fucking disappear and Lena can’t be mad because there might actually be an emergency. But maybe she also can be mad because Kara kissed her and ran away, and she hasn’t been able to stop thinking about it or her or doing it again with her and they need to talk about it, damn it.
Because maybe she’d finally realized that they’re more than just best friends – that maybe the butterflies she feels when Kara smiles at her aren’t one-sided, and she didn’t need to ignore them anymore. Maybe the soft way Kara always looks at her isn’t in her head, or she doesn’t look at all her friends that way – maybe it actually means something. And she thinks if they talk this out, it might just go somewhere beautiful for them.
If only she could pin Kara down long enough to actually get a word in.
***
It’s one thing for Kara to avoid her at work. Lena doesn’t follow her around CatCo, necessarily, she has her own work to do, but she maybe does take the long way to most of her meetings just so that she can walk by Kara’s desk. Most of the time she’s not there, and Lena tries very hard to convince herself that it’s not because Kara can hear her coming. But when she is there and her eyes catch Lena’s, she makes a flying motion with her hand, points at her ear with a sheepish smile and disappears.
On the third day, Kara walks fully into an elevator Lena’s on, sees her, blushes from her hairline to where her collarbones disappear into her cute button down, and does a complete 180 to take the stairs instead.
This all makes it very hard for Lena not to think that Kara hates her now, or wants nothing to do with her, or thinks she made a huge mistake when she kissed her.
But honestly, she doesn’t think that’s the case. Being friends with Kara has done wonders for Lena’s self-esteem, and she knows she’s a catch. She knows Kara loves her. It suddenly doesn’t seem like the biggest stretch that she could be in love with her, too.
***
At the DEO, Kara runs around just as much, not that she ever spent much time with Lena there in the first place – they work in completely different departments, but still. It’s weird to not see Kara hanging around the lab in her very little free time, or to just catch a flash of red around a corner when she steps into the command center.
More than anything, Lena misses her best friend and the sunshine (pun intended) she brought into her life. And while she’s kind of irritated with Kara for running from her, she’s sure she has her reasons, and she’ll do her best to give her the time she needs.
(But she also really just wants a hug from her best friend.)
***
On day two, Lena hears, by way of Alex, that Kara dropped her phone from some incredible height and smashed it to pieces. She raises an eyebrow at the older Danvers sister, and she can see that Alex almost cracks, but she just shrugs.
“Kara’s clumsy.”
“She also has superspeed.”
“You’re not going to catch me in a lie, Luthor, her phone’s broken, so.”
“She’s avoiding me. You’re telling me she went so far as to actually intentionally break her phone?”
“I’m not saying anything. Although may I remind you that you have a key to her place?”
“Did she tell you what happened when she asked you to convey this little message to me?”
“Not really, but I can guess.”
It’s Alex’s turn to raise a suggestive eyebrow, and they part ways with knowing smiles and a mutual understanding. Lena somehow feels lighter, even if nothing’s really been resolved.
***
Lena doesn’t want to use her key to Kara’s place to force her to talk. She really doesn’t. She wants to give her the time she needs to process this, process her feelings, decide what this means and what she wants it to mean… But it’s been three days without a word from her best friend, and before she disappeared on her, she kissed her and gave her hope for something she didn’t even realize she was allowed to hope for in the first place.
As much as Lena knows Kara needs time, she needs closure. And answers. And most of all, she needs her Kara back.
Still, she’s not going to just barge in (yet), so she knocks softly on the door. She knows Kara probably already knows she’s there, she’d once admitted to keeping track of Lena’s heartbeat when they’re apart. (Another addition to the list that keeps Lena’s hope alive, even though Kara hasn’t spoken to her since the kiss. Surely casually listening to her heart can’t be platonic?) She waits a few seconds and then knocks again.
“Kara. I know you know I’m here. I don’t want to force you to talk, but I really think we need to. Please let me in?”
She thinks she hears soft footsteps coming towards the door, but they stop just short and there’s silence for a moment.
“Kara – “
The door opens and Kara stands there, looking impossibly cute and soft in her cloud pajama pants and a T-shirt. She’s smiling shyly but genuinely, and Lena feels affection explode in her chest. She can’t help herself when she pulls Kara into a hug.
“I’ve missed you.”
“I’m sor-“ Kara starts, but Lena interrupts her.
“I’m not trying to guilt you, Kara. I just want to be honest, and I have – I have missed you.”
“I’ve missed you too. And I am sorry, for avoiding you. And since we’re being honest, I have been avoiding you, and I’m not trying to make excuses, it was definitely wrong of me, but I would like to explain why I – “
Lena softly grabs Kara’s hands from where they’re frantically twisting together between them, and Kara abruptly stops talking. She can see the tension bleed out of Kara’s body, can physically feel her calm down at the soft, familiar touch.
“How about we sit down, huh? I’ll make some tea,” she says, her smile soft and lighting up all sorts of feelings in Lena’s chest as she leads her to the kitchen by her hand. Lena sits down at the kitchen island and quietly watches as Kara gets two mugs from her cupboard and switches on the kettle. She turns to Lena, leaning on the counter between them, when she’s dropped the teabags into the mugs, the only sound between them the soft bubbling of the boiling water.
“So,” Lena starts, slightly enjoying the faint blush that creeps up Kara’s neck as she realizes what’s about to happen.
“So,” Kara practically squeaks.
“You kissed me.”
“I did.” Kara looks terrified at the prospect of discussing this, but she takes a deep breath and looks up into Lena’s eyes. “I guess this is where I explain myself, huh?”
Lena smiles as encouragingly as she can. “I’d appreciate it, yes.”
The kettle whistles and Lena thinks for a moment Kara is going to take the out as she turns around to prepare their mugs of tea. Instead, though, Kara goes about pouring out the hot water into the mugs, but she talks as she does it – she’s completely focused on her hands, but it seems that helps her talk about her feelings more freely.
“Well, first I want to apologize again for just leaving like that – I know it must have hurt, and you must have been so confused, and that’s not what I wanted at all. So I really am sorry, I never want to hurt you, Lena. And you should know that Alex gave me hell for it, she’s grown really fond of you. She’s been on my case about talking to you, too. So.”
She places Lena’s mug in front of her, wrapping her hands around her own and still not meeting Lena’s eyes. She sighs softly as she stirs her teabag around, and continues in a small voice. A crinkle forms between her eyes as she speaks, and Lena listens with rapt attention.
“It was just a normal Tuesday, you know? I didn’t even know I was going to do it until I did, but – you were talking about your nanotech project and you were so passionate, so happy to be helping, to be saving the world – you were just. It was beautiful. You were beautiful.”
With her last sentence, she finally looks up from her mug, and Lena couldn’t look away from those blue eyes if she wanted to. She’s completely captivated by the soft affection – dare she call it love? – written across Kara’s face.
“You were so beautiful, and I just couldn’t not kiss you anymore.”
Lena wants to do many things. She wants to tell Kara that she feels the same, she wants to take Kara’s hand, she wants to lean across the counter and kiss her senseless – but she does none of those things. Her rational brain wins out and won’t let her act until she has all the information. Won’t let her take the chance until she’s sure what will happen.
“And then you ran.”
Kara winces. “And then I ran. Lena, I – you have to understand – I felt so much when I kissed you, and it terrified me. I just, I wasn’t ready for you to reject me, I didn’t think my heart could take it and I just – I did the first thing I thought of, and I flew away. I’m sorry, I know it wasn’t the right thing to do, but I just – I wanted to live in a world where you could return my feelings for a little while longer. I just wanted to pretend for a bit.”
Kara’s smile has turned sad, and she shrugs. “I’m hopelessly in love with you, Lena Luthor, and I couldn’t handle the thought of you not loving me back, so I ran away.”
Kara still looks terrified, even behind the smile, and Lena – after she takes a few moments to process the words I’m hopelessly in love with you, Lena Luthor – finally gains the courage to take her friend’s hand in hers. She can feel Kara shaking, and she would find the fact that she can make the Girl of Steel so vulnerable satisfying if she wasn’t focusing so hard on what to say.
“Why did you think I was going to reject you?”
“You… you weren’t?”
“Kara Danvers, I’ve been waiting for you to kiss me since the second time you took me to breakfast.”
“That time you cleaned the syrup off my face and licked it off your thumb and I didn’t think of anything else for three weeks?”
Kara blushes as she says it, and Lena feels the heat crawl up her own neck at the reminder of that day.
“You mean that time you lifted me a little when you hugged me goodbye and I went home and screamed into my pillow like a teenage girl?”
“We’re both idiots, then,” Kara chuckles, and Lena can finally tell that she’s not nervous anymore. “I should have kissed you a long time ago.” She makes her way around the counter and Lena leans into the hand Kara places on her waist as she steps between her legs.
“You should have.”
“You could’ve kissed me, you know.”
Lena reaches up to lace her fingers behind Kara’s neck. “Even I don’t have the guts to just… kiss Supergirl.”
“I’m just Kara.”
“Somehow that’s even more terrifying.”
“Lena.”
“Kara.”
“I don’t want to be an idiot anymore.”
There’s that soft stroke of Kara’s thumb across her cheekbone again, and then Lena’s pulled off her stool by the arm Kara has around her waist. Kara kisses her with purpose this time, pressing into Lena and winding her fingers into her hair at the base of her neck. She pulls away for a second, only to dive back in, her tongue making contact with Lena’s. Lena isn’t sure if the soft sigh she hears comes from her or from Kara, but she presses further into Kara at the sound anyway.
Finally, after what feels both like hours and like only seconds, Kara pulls back just enough to press her forehead against Lena’s. She’s breathing quite heavily, overcome with emotion if Lena’s own emotional state is anything to go by.
“Don’t run away,” she breathes across Kara’s lips. They’re still so close she can almost feel her smile.
“Are you kidding?” Kara whispers. “I never want to be further from you than I am right now, ever again. I’m not going anywhere.”
“In case it wasn’t clear – I’m hopelessly in love with you too, Kara Danvers.”
***