Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

For once, the siren was silent. No voice emitted from the intercom requesting assistance from aid cars, engines, or even something as simple as a ladder. No one came rushing in to drop a baby or yell at the staff to just come out and help, please.

For once, it was a Friday night, and the night shift of Station 15 could sit down in the dining room and just enjoy their dinner. They could take off their jackets. They could let down their hair. They could take their time seasoning the food to get it all right. They could do all those things. Maybe even take a nap here and there after a long shift.

"It's Friday, right?" Sam asked, swinging the plastic fork around with a suspicious frown on the bridge of her nose.

Probably thinking the same thing as everyone else in the station but too afraid to actually say it out loud, Lucy surreptitiously fished out her phone and checked the calendar. She turned it around to show the glaring date at Sam and everyone else over her shoulder. Her eyes were narrowed suspiciously as well.

Yes, yes, it was Friday, indeed. Friday night, in fact. Friday night, and they weren't constantly returning and heading out on a rotation, as any fire departments in the country were prone to do on this particular night. To be fair, Sam and Lucy weren't the only ones suspicious. Even Kara, who was probably the most optimistic of them all, was feeling a little strange this night.

But once again, they never said it out loud. Firefighters carried the same philosophy as trauma doctors; something that was too good to be true shouldn't be taken for granted. Never say the words out loud, and they should be fine. They should be able to play the Xbox for the whole night and not have to worry about a thing.

"Should it be this quiet –" Literally all of Station 15 released loud and unhappy groans as soon as the word left Nia's mouth "– on a Friday night?" Nia tapered off, clearly sensing that she'd said the wrong thing.

Lucy glared at Kara accusatively. "She's your newbie."

Kara threw her hands up. "Just because we get along doesn't mean she's my responsibility alone. She's our newbie," she complained. Taking pity on Nia's remaining confusion, she sighed and said, "We never say that word as a firefighter. No matter where you are, we just don't say it."

"What word?"

"No, I'm not saying it."

"Qui –"

"No!" everyone yelled, with Leslie oddly being the loudest, given that she was always sulking in a corner and mumbling under her breath.

In that instance, literally the very instance everyone breathed the tail end of a single-syllable word, the siren went off. Loud and invasive and completely uncaring for the few who had yet to finish their dinner. Through the intercom came the automated voice. Clear and monotone and totally unaware of the disturbance he had issued.

As the voice read out the apparatuses needed for this particular emergency – a five-car pileup – the firefighters heaved in disappointment at an oddly peaceful Friday night and began rushing towards the apparatus bay.

"The word, by the way, is 'quiet'," Kara informed Nia as they ran towards the bay.

After all, an emergency was already happening. People were already injured. The night was already ruined. There was no point in keeping up with the taboo.

The five-car pileup was very much worse than it sounded. Two cars on top of one another; Sam was still trying to figure out the mechanics of it all, since she was the captain and all. One car's head stuck into the back of the bottom car of the two cars. Another two had somehow wrapped themselves around the same tree.

People were crying. Blood was flowing like those slushie machines in a 7-11. Children were trapped inside one of the cars, quite literally losing air as the firefighters figured out some way to extricate the kids without hurting them further.

This was Friday night. Kara had seen her sum of terrible things in her five years as a firefighter in National City, but this was definitely one of the worst scenarios she'd ever had to show up for. Five years ago, Kara would have thrown herself at a bush and throw up her dinner, but now, she only braced herself, put on her Lieutenant helmet, and got to work, as per Sam's instructions.

Once she was sure that Lucy and James were figuring out the children situation, she headed over to the area where the people involved were gathered, sitting on the curb and nursing their various injuries. Kara didn't allow herself the luxury of sympathizing or pitying them; she wouldn't be able to do her job if she did.

Instead, she checked for pulses and instant reactions. She touched bodies and figured out what hurt and what did no. Next to her, Barry and Caitlin were doing the same thing. They couldn't allow themselves to sympathize or pity these people, even though as Kara heard a mother wailing in the back for Kara's colleagues to save her babies trapped in the car, she wanted to just head over and pry the door open herself.

An elderly gentleman had suddenly ended up seizing, grabbing the attention of basically everyone else at the curb. In the whim of the moment, because that was what EMTs did – in the whim of the moment – Kara deduced that the man had been trapped in the car for far too long, adding onto the weak lungs that his wife mentioned he had, leading to this seizure.

"We have to bag him," Kara authorized, gesturing wildly at either Barry or Caitlin to hand her the kit.

"That won't work," an authoritative voice said from behind her.

Kara stopped whatever she was doing, as did Barry and Caitlin, to turn around and find a woman standing there. Even under the darkness and the flashing lights of the fire engines and aid cars, there was really no mistaking that this woman was sculpted very carefully by the hands of the creators, if there was every such a thing.

Despite the urgency of the situation, she blinked a couple of times, unable to believe the sight before her. Silky black hair, albeit longer. Clean blouse and slacks, completely unlike the messy shirts and jeans that she was used to. Red lips, always, Kara wondered if it was still the same brand from Sephora. But those eyes, green and electric, they never failed in striking Kara to the core.

She gulped and took in the familiar vision before her, amidst the chaos surrounding them. And god, the last time she was so frozen in place with no words to escape her lips – the last time, she didn't like to think about the last time.

"Who are you?" Caitlin asked with a frown.

The woman looked away from Kara to her colleague. "Lena Luthor. I'm a doctor at NC General," she replied quickly and knelt down beside Kara. No, actually, she pushed Kara away, and the blonde just took it, sidestepping to allow the woman – Lena – to take her spot. "You said it yourself. The guy's run out of oxygen. Bagging him while he's seizing won't help. We need a thoracotomy."

"Are you insane? We're in the middle of the road!" Barry exclaimed.

Lena lifted her gaze at Barry with a mixture of disdain and disappointment, as if she couldn't believe someone like Barry could be a certified paramedic. She then returned her gaze to Kara, pinning the blonde down again, and rolled up her sleeves.

"You're in charge, correct?" Gone was the softness that Kara was used to, replaced by stiffness and professionalism that she had only ever witnessed directed to, well, people who were not her.

"Yes," Kara replied weakly.

"Emergency thoracotomy. Right now. I guarantee you right now, Lieutenant –" Lena addressed after having one quick look at the title printed on Kara's helmet "– this man will die if we don't do this right now."

It didn't seem possible, but the environment seemed to have gone hotter as Lena remained by her side, making it more sweltering under the turnout gear that Kara was wrapped up in from head to toe. She frowned and shook herself, forcing herself to ask, "Can I see some credentials?"

The doctor made a double-take at the demand. Kara could see in her defiant eyes that she was about to defy, probably claiming that Kara knew damn well that she was a doctor – a damn good one at that. Fortunately though, Lena huffily reached into her back pocket to fish out a badge that clearly stated that she was a trauma attending at National City General Hospital.

Kara couldn't help but notice the time stamp of the badge. Only acquired two days ago. Two days, and Kara had been lounging around at Station 15, having no knowledge of this woman's presence in her city. Two days, they'd been circling in each other's orbits.

Badge in hand and ignorant of all the eyes on her, she swiveled around to locate Sam in the crowd, clearly busy with all the other work that needed to be done. Logically, Sam, of all people, should know more about this than anyone else on the planet. And yet, for the past two days, she'd made no hint or clue about Lena Luthor coming to National City. None at all.

"Lieutenant," Lena snapped. "This man's life is hanging by a thread here. Thoracotomy. Now."

"Right," Kara replied and nodded, snatching the kit from Caitlin and laying it open. "I hope you know what you're doing."

"I always know what I'm doing," Lena scoffed.

Barry and Caitlin watched as Kara suddenly became Lena's assist. She dutifully followed Lena's instructions. Calming prescription. Scalpel. Disinfectant. Tube. Tapes. Lena talked, and Kara listened.

When the deed was done, the wife was wailing as her husband stopped seizing and started seizing again, even regaining consciousness for a couple of seconds before fainting again. They loaded him into the back of the aid car, followed by Lena and the wife.

"Did she just say her name's –"

"Lena Luthor, yeah," Caitlin confirmed Barry's incomplete inquiry.

"Lena Luthor, like the Lena Luthor."

"Lena Luthor, like the sister of Lex Luthor, Lena Luthor."

Kara didn't take her eyes off the aid car. Even as it rounded a block and disappeared from her sight, she stood there, completely unhearing of the screams and cries still going on behind her. It felt like déjà vu, except she suspected that it wouldn't much of a déjà vu if Lena was here to stay.

She clenched her jaw as her heart clenched itself. Yep, déjà vu. Shaking her head wildly, she swung back around and went back to the curb. Now was not the time to think about anything other than the people she still had to tend to.

Three hours later, the last of the victims were sent to NC General, the nearest hospital in their vicinity. The cars had been towed away. The roads were cleared. Everyone went back to their daily lives, none the wiser of the five-car tragedy that would turn out to be some long ass reports.

Kara had resigned herself to a long night of sitting in front of her laptop, helping Sam draft out the reports, because that was what Lieutenants and Captains did. That was the least favorite part of her job, to be frank. When she signed up to be a firefighter, she was into it for the action and the thrill of being at the very frontline; she didn't expect the paperwork that came with it.

But since she was already at the hospital with its myriad of vending machines scattered around, she might as well take advantage of it. Waving at Barry and Caitlin to head back to the station, she refused to enter the building, instead choosing to round the hospital from the ER entrance to the main entrance, where there was a coffee cart sitting just outside.

She purchased a cup of piping hot latte and was about to walk back to the station, until she saw Lena sitting on a bench just a few yards away.

Kara stood, rooted to the spot by the coffee cart, and hesitated in whether she should play blind or be the bigger woman, as they would say. Eliza would probably advise her to do the latter, while Alex would definitely urge her to run as far as she could. Or Alex wouldn't, since she didn't even deign to warn Kara about Lena coming to National City. Working in the same hospital as her, even.

Would she be able to take it? Could she walk away again? Did she want to walk away? All questions that Kara had no answer to. Not three years ago, certainly not now.

Before she could sanction, her legs had automatically brought her, slow step by slow step, to the bench. Before she knew it, she was standing there, towering over Lena, within talking distance without fear of the other not hearing them. She hesitated, but offered a small smile, to which Lena, thankfully, returned.

"Hey," she greeted, and found herself very glad that she did not choke.

Lena, the woman who made debate a hobby, didn't say a word for the first few moments, only staring up at Kara with her mouth slightly opened. And then she gulped and said, "Hey."

Say something. Anything. The rational part of her brain knew it would make most sense for her to keep the conversation going. But the petty part of her, the enamored and messy part of her, wasn't really sure how she could even keep the conversation, or if she would be able to handle it.

She opened her mouth, thinking that since she was in a habit of saying things before she could think them through, she might as well let the motors run in this situation. Except the motors were failing her, sputtering down the road with no grease, and she opened her mouth and had nothing to say.

She looked at Lena and she thought that she shouldn't have come here. She should have minded her own business and walked off the premises with her piping hot latte. There was absolutely no reason for her to walk over here and pretend that three years had been enough to soothe the complete chaos that she'd left behind.

That both of them had left behind.

Instead of walking away, she sat down beside Lena on the bench, though with significant distance between them. She extended the cup over to Lena, deciding that she could buy another for herself.

She shrugged when Lena turned curious eyes at her. "I know how much you like caffeine after a surgery," she remarked.

"Is this that horrendous oversweet latte that you tend to go for?" Lena asked, raising a brow.

"Always so judgmental," Kara complained with a playful frown. "Come on, just take the coffee."

After a moment of reluctance, the raven-haired woman ended up taking the cup anyway; of course, she blanched after having take a sip, but at least she didn't complain more or put the cup away. Small mercies.

Not another word was spoken. Lena's finger was relentless on the lid of the cup, wearing it away sooner or later. Kara made sure to look at the tree in front of them, though she'd admit that she stole glances at the woman once or twice. This was undeniably awkward, completely unlike the comfortable silences they used to find themselves in ensconced in.

There were reports waiting to be written back at the station. Sam was probably already slaving away while Lucy was teasing Nia for speaking the cursed word that got them all here in the first place. Not usually a superstitious person, but she did wonder momentarily if she could blame the newbie for her current awkward situation.

"Did you choose trauma or neuro?" Kara finally asked.

"Both," Lena announced, not without a huge sense of pride in her voice. Her smile was telling enough.

"Of course you did," Kara scoffed. "You just like to make things more complicated for yourself."

Lena made an affronted noise. "I like both, I can do both, so I chose both. What's wrong with that?" she demanded, her voice high-pitched, which was a big hint at her defense system rising up.

And Kara, well, she had never failed in rising up to the challenge when it came in the form of Lena Luthor, no matter how long it had been since they last saw one another. "Three years ago, you were complaining at me for –" she stopped herself short before she brought up bad memories and ruined the night further. She shoved her hands in her jacket pockets and adjusted her glasses.

"No, go ahead," Lena prodded, her voice stiff and low.

Kara looked up from her boots to be pinned in place by those goddamn eyes. She didn't like to admit weaknesses, but this woman in front of her had definitely been one of her weaknesses. Sometimes, she would have an inkling that Lena still was, actually, except she didn't allow herself the time or space to dig into that.

God, talk about a wrench in her plans to stay as far away as possible and banning even the slightest mention of Lena within her social circle.

She shook her head with a melancholic smile and stood up, hands still shoved in her pockets, because if she let them hang in the air, there was no guarantee that she wouldn't take Lena and airlift them very, very far away from here. That would be kidnapping, and Kara didn't condone that. Maybe a little, in this situation. She found that she'd condone anything when it came to Lena, even giving up her caffeine boost.

Gesturing vaguely around them, she asked, "Is National City permanent? Or just a stop?"

Lena offered only a shrug, deflating where she sat. "I signed a two-year contract with the hospital," she replied. "So I'll be here for two years, at least."

Their paths would be crossing for the next two years, maybe even more, because one of them was a paramedic and firefighter while the other was a trauma surgeon. Their paths would cross a hell of a lot more than she wanted, and Kara suspected, more than Lena wanted.

"Good to see you again, Lena," she offered.

"No, it's not."

Kara chuckled and nodded reluctantly. "No, no, it's not, Lena. But we will be seeing each other, like it or not." She sighed. "Did you know – who am I kidding? Of course you knew I'd be here."

"If you're gonna imply that I came here because of you, Kara –"

"No, no," Kara denied quickly, laughing to herself. "I'm not that big of an idiot. You've never allowed something as mediocre as a woman inspire you to do anything in your life. I know that firsthand," she added with a taste of self-deprecation. She didn't just know it firsthand; she knew it too well. This conversation was going nowhere, so she pointed a finger over her shoulder. "I should go. Reports to write. Naps to take. All that stuff."

Lena didn't say anything. She just lowered her head in…approval? Agreement? The last time they came to an agreement, they walked out of each other's lives.

Kara spun on her feet and walked away before she did anything stupid. Stupid like kidnapping Lena. Stupid like sitting down to Lena again and never do anything. Stupid like choosing to stay at this hospital to get a coffee, knowing full well that Lena would still be here, because Lena never did anything half-assed.

Honestly, she should have seen this coming. But she didn't, and ensued was an awkward conversation with underlying tones of resentment. For the second time in her life, she walked away in her life. However, she didn't swear once again that she would never think about Lena again. This conversation was proof enough that she wasn't strong enough for that.

Kara (1:46 a.m.): did u knw

Alex (1:48 a.m.): Know what?

Kara (1:48 a.m.): lena.

Alex (1:49 a.m.): What about her?
Alex (1:49 a.m.): Didn't you ban us from ever speaking her name?

Kara (1:50 a.m.): haha
Kara (1:50 a.m.): gud 1

Alex (2:04 a.m.): What is it?
Alex (2:15 a.m.): Kara, talk to me.
Alex (2:21 a.m.): Oh crap
Alex (2:21 a.m.): I swear I didn't know

The aid car and ladder were gone by the time she'd arrived to the station, which took her a 20-minute walk that barely gave her enough time to process everything that had gone on tonight. It seemed like Nia had jinxed them for the rest of their shift; she hoped that the young woman would learn her lesson for the rest of her career as a firefighter.

But apparently, it wasn't too big an emergency, as there was still quite a significant number of staff left in the station when she passed by the pantry, though Nia was notably absent. Lucy had presumably made sure Nia learned her lesson by planning to send her out on every call they got throughout their shift.

Winn, who was lounging in the entertainment room and reading a book, informed her that Sam was in her office when she passed by the room as well. Before proceeding to sit in front of her laptop for the rest of the night, Kara made her way into the locker room first and got a shower that was scalding hot, as if it would scrape away the lingering traces of Lena's stare and voice.

"Did you know?" she asked as soon as she strode into Sam's office, laptop in tow.

Sam looked up from her computer, caught off guard from Kara's interruption. At least she had the decency to look confused before realization came upon her, clearly shown in the guilt in her eyes and the way her mouth opened and closed repeatedly for the next few seconds.

Slowly, the brunette nodded. "Yes," she said.

Kara made her displeasure known by placing the laptop rather loudly on the spare table in the office and kicking at the chair so it would roll out from under it. The scowl on her face was perhaps telling enough, but as she'd been told, she liked to be dramatic.

It may be petty, but she took joy in the way the captain's face wince at every noise Kara made without actually making noise. And then Kara sat down and turned on her laptop. While waiting for it to boot up, she swiveled the chair around to face her superior who was also her sister-in-law. She tightened her jaw and crossed her arms, waiting for Sam to speak up.

"Alex doesn't know."

"She knows now." Sam winced again, probably expecting the doghouse Alex would be putting her once she got home. "Did you expect to keep it a secret forever?" Sam raised her brows and inhaled deeply, shrugging helplessly. "Are you kidding me?"

"She didn't want you to know."

"She works in the same hospital as my sister, who, I might add, is your wife!" Kara exclaimed.

"I told her that."

"We're firefighters. I send patients to that hospital regularly!"

"I told her that too." When Kara was about to launch into more useless explanations, Sam raised her hands to stop her. "I'll admit that she wasn't being very smart about this." Kara scoffed, shaking her head and crossing her arms again, because Lena was the smartest person she knew, even more than her sister and parents. "She's my best friend. I was respecting her wishes."

"I almost couldn't do my job out there."

"I really didn't know she was going to be there."

"You should have at least warned me that she'd be in the same city as us."

Sam sighed again, shaking her head and brushing her fingers through her loose hair. But she didn't say anything else, as if she knew that Kara's anger wouldn't subside no matter how much she justified herself. It would take time, and sooner or later, they would go back to being the sisters-in-law that they were, but for now, Kara just couldn't.

Not when she could hear Lena's voice so clearly in her head. Not when she could picture every fleck of jade in Lena's eyes without making a mistake. Not when she could remember three years ago so vividly in her head, all brought back by one single accidental encounter. Literally.

"I kind of can't believe that Lena Luthor is working in NC General now," Barry commented, all of them sidling out of the station at the end of their shift.

"I'm betting she's the youngest attending there now. Or anywhere," Caitlin added on.

"Where was she previously?" Winn asked.

"Metropolitan General," Kara cut in, her eyes glued to her shoes as she walked. "She took her MCAT at 20. Graduated Johns Hopkins one year early. Entered a residency program in Metropolitan General and never left. Double board certified in neuro and trauma. Oh, she was married for about two years after passing MCAT with flying colors," she rattled off, unable to stop herself, well aware of the wary gazes that James, Lucy, and Sam were sending her.

She paused her steps when it was apparent that the rest of them had stopped as well, all of whom were gaping at her.

"How do – how do you know that?" Barry asked.

Kara lifted her gaze to the sky, dark blue as the sun was still on its way up. Another day gone by, but what a chaotic one. What a wild one. What a day.

"I'm her ex-wife."

Chapter Text

Yellow. Bright. Lively.

Those were words that could be used to describe National City, as opposed to Metropolis, which was a little grey, still lively, but maybe somewhat too busy. Apart from New York, Metropolis was easily one of the busiest cities in the country. Growing up in it meant getting used to it, but it didn't mean liking it. Metropolis was just too close to Gotham for it to ever be peaceful.

Lena had grown up indifferent to Metropolis; she supposed everyone grew up numb to the place they were born in, unless it was a really nice place or a really bad place. She was born there, studied there, earned her MCAT there, got double-board certified there, and became a renown neurosurgeon with a trauma certificate under her belt.

By all logic, she should have loved it for giving her everything she needed to build her career, but it was nonetheless stale and grey. Then again, if anyone asked her why she'd chosen to move to National City, she still wouldn't know the answer.

One day, she'd picked up a call from the Chief of Surgery at National City General, listening to a job offer that was kind of similar to the one she had at Metropolitan General, and hardly hesitated before she accepted it. She didn't even take a couple of days to consider her prospects; she just confirmed her willingness and signed the letter of appointment once it was emailed to her.

And now she was here, and she still wasn't sure how she felt about it, all the more complicated now that she'd met her ex-wife only one week into her having officially moved her.

"I hate you."

Lena calmly drank her coffee, situated in a calm corner of the café near her new place, which was coincidentally only a block away from Sam's.

"I'm in the doghouse now because of you," Sam tagged on, collapsing on the chair in front of Lena and snatching her coffee away. "Go make it up to me by buying another coffee for yourself. This is mine now," she grumbled, determinedly drinking from the cup and glaring at Lena over the lid.

Lena sighed and remained where she was. She'd just gotten off a 36-hour shift; she didn't need the coffee anyway. "This city is weird."

"Yeah, because it has your ex-wife and ex-sister-in-law in it. Go away," Sam retorted, rolling her eyes and placing the coffee down, though she had a hand wrapped around it protectively. "I slept in the guest room last night. All because of you. I hope you're happy."

"I can't believe that human beings are capable of smiling so much. Even when they're dying in the hospital, they're still smiling. What's in the water?"

"Alex is still not talking to me. Kara is still smashing things around at the station, also not talking to me."

Clenching her jaw at the mention of Kara's name, she opted to look out the window, where there was a mother-daughter pair strolling down the sidewalk, the child holding a balloon and bouncing happily while the mother smiling in indulgence. "Last night, I went to the coffee cart downstairs. It was like 10pm or something, but the guy's still smiling and doesn't seem to care that he's being kept awake because doctors don't stop working. That was weird as hell."

Sam slapped the table between them, so loud that it attracted the attention of their neighbors. Lena turned back to find her best friend glaring at her. "Are you listening to me?" Sam hissed through gritted teeth. "I get it. The city's weird. We'll talk about it when my wife's done banishing me and my sister-in-law isn't trying to kill me with her eyes."

Heaving a deep pocket of air, Lena shook her head and combed her fingers through her hair. "Alex is gonna forgive you in the next couple of days. The woman couldn't bear to be apart from you even if she tried," she dismissed easily, having witnessed the progression of Sam and Alex's relationship over the years. "As for Kara, well, she's a forgiving person. It'll blow over. For you, anyway."

The captain of Station 15 stared at her, studied her, with narrowed eyes and all. Lena didn't relent, keeping their contact as she tapped her fingers on the tabletop. There really was no point in relenting or arguing further. They could all glare at her or throw viper venom at her.

She didn't grow up among the Luthor household without developing some thick skin. She could take it. Besides, the contract had been signed, and she wasn't willing to part with the penalty money in lieu of staying, not after she had decided not to dip into the trust fund her father had set up for her. She was here to stay, even though she had no clue why.

Amidst the hustle and bustle of the morning rush in this café, a girl suddenly laughed, joined by a boy. They were holding hands and probably preparing to go to college, happy as lark.

Lena shook her head and pinched her lips. "This city is weird."

The truth was she knew that Kara was in National City. She knew that Kara was a firefighter in the same station as Sam. She knew that NC General regularly accepted patients from Station 15, because they operated within the same vicinity. She knew that they would meet eventually.

She just didn't know it would be this soon. After all, her employment had only begun a few days ago, and she'd mainly been in the neurosurgery wing to take over things from the former of Head of Neurosurgery. Hell, she hadn't even actually met Alex yet, even though they worked in the same hospital.

It surprised her just as much to encounter Kara on the roadside, doing her life's work as a firefighter. The very work that had become the tipping point of the end of their marriage.

Seeing Kara again had been – well, Lena couldn't even really put it into words. The glasses, the striking blue eyes, and the face that had set off a thousand ships inside Lena's stomach the first time they met. For a second, it brought her back to that very moment, when a young Kara had decided to drape her jacket over a young Lena's shoulder at a frat party.

When they were still married, Lena detested Kara's occupation. The lack of security and the everlasting fear grasping her chest whenever Kara had to be called out. But now that they were here, their names on the dotted lines of divorce papers that they both had copies of, Lena knew for sure that she was proud of her ex-wife, even though Kara would never know it.

God forbid Kara ever knew that Lena was proud of her achievements, making it as a paramedic and a lieutenant. She would never hear the end of it. She didn't ever wanna hear it.

Trauma was thrilling. Neurosurgery was challenging. If anything, they were both the opposite of one another. Trauma required snap decisions within a fraction of a second to preserve a patient's life until the next stop. Neurosurgery compelled calmness and precision to make sure that the surgeon wouldn't accidentally fry the patient's brain and render them dead, or worse, in vegetative state.

By all logical senses, it wouldn't make sense for a doctor to want to do both – one simply wouldn't have the patience for the other. Except…Lena did exactly just that.

She had been in her second year of residency at Metropolitan General, and was still finding it hard to decide which field she wanted to enter. Kara hadn't been around, always getting called away to capture snakes or hose down fires, always risking her life every time she ran into a burning building. The blonde simply didn't have the energy to listen to Lena and her troubles every time she came home.

So after they'd divorced and Kara had skipped down – Lena had heard that from Sam, no less – she sat in a bar with her brother, toasting to the rebeginning of her bachelorette life and pretending that she wasn't still mourning the end of her marriage. Her bald, loving brother, who was himself a genius as a medical geneticist, had somehow given her the best advice she'd ever received in her adult life.

"Just go for both. You're smart as fuck, Lena, smarter than me, even. No one ever said you can only choose one," he had said nonchalantly, draining a shot of vodka and gesturing at the bartender to get him more.

And that was it. And here she was. She didn't know if she made history, but she did know she was more than qualified to be here. However, qualified as she was in neurosurgery and trauma, she certainly wasn't qualified in things like meeting her former sister-in-law after three years of stone-cold silence, despite her best friend being married to said former sister-in-law.

"This cannot be happening," Lena muttered to herself after seeing Alex standing outside the ER, all outfitted in the gear.

Alex turned to her, instructions ready at her lips, only to do a doubletake when she saw who was standing next to her. Lena gulped and looked away from Alex' stormy expression, unwilling to let the look in those eyes deter her from her work. Proper work. The business of saving lives.

An aid car pulled up. When the back doors opened, Lena groaned again. This really could not be happening.

Kara took a pause when she recognized the two doctors standing there, waiting for her. For a moment, the siren went on and on and on, but all three of them just stayed rooted on the spot, kind of in similar states of disbelief. Seriously, it was like the universe was pulling some strings just to make lives harder for all of them.

Fortunately, Kara shook herself out of her daze and jumped out from the aid car, pulling the stretcher from the inside. She started rattling off the stats, mainly focused on Alex, which was fine with Lena, truly. She just wanted to get this over with and pretend that she had met her ex-wife in as many weeks. God, it's a nightmare.

"He tried to cut his ear off," Kara said.

"He what?" Lena exclaimed, noticing a bag that Kara had produced, a bag that contained a sawed-off ear. "We should – we should call psych," she said and gestured for a resident to grab the bag. "Page plastics too."

"We gave him a sedative, but before that, he claimed he was hearing things. Whatever that means."

"Psych. Definitely psych," Alex agreed.

Kara shrugged, because they all had their roles and hers was just to ensure that the patient stayed alive on the way to the hospital. Now, it was Alex and Lena's responsibility to ensure that the patient survived through it all.

Lena got herself situated on one side of the gurney while Alex on the other. As they rolled the patient inside, Lena had to force every muscle in her to keep her eyes on one direction, to not look at the blonde standing behind them at all.

Apart from the guy who tried to cut his ear off, the ER was fairly quiet, save for a few strokes and car crashes. All in all, Lena's first rotation in the ER would have been good, if it wasn't for the encounter earlier.

She sat at the nurses' station, deliberately filtering out Alex's voice and presence, even though she knew full well that the woman was the Head of Trauma, and sooner and later, they would have to talk to each other again. Well, she would face that when it came. For now, she would make herself sit here and cycle through the ER's system to familiarize herself. There was no point in being a trauma surgeon at a hospital if she didn't know how their trauma department worked.

About three quarters into the process, a coffee cup slid into her view. Lena would recognize that wedding ring on that hand anywhere, if only because she'd been dragged to pick it out with Sam four years ago. God, she remembered how she'd chastised Sam for deciding to get married so young; little did she know that a year later, she would be proposed to herself.

"Stop being proud and take the damn coffee," Alex ordered stiffly, jerking the coffee at her.

Lena sighed and reluctantly took it, still refusing to look at Alex. "I hope it's not anything stupid like cappuccino or latte," she commented lowly, stirring the liquid with the stirrer.

Alex sat down on a spare chair next to her and made a disgusted noise. "I'm not disgusting like her," she deadpanned. When Lena finally looked, she realized that Alex had been doing the same thing, not looking – no wonder they used to be close. "You could have told me," Alex blurted out after a long moment of just people watching.

Lena shrugged. "I deleted your number."

"That is harsh," Alex scoffed, shaking her head, an inadvertent smile crawling onto her face. "Seriously?" Lena nodded in affirmation. "Did you block me too?"

The neurosurgeon winced, stirring the coffee a little faster now. At this point, the sugar would evaporate before Lena had even taken a sip, not that science actually worked that way. "Yeah, yeah, I did."

Alex scoffed and shook her head again, completely in a state of disbelief at how straightforward Lena had been and still was. "You're a stone-cold woman, Dr. Lena Luthor."

"Yes, your sister told me that once."

At the mention of Kara – not even her name, for the love of god – they both sobered up. It was as if they were emanating negative energy, just driving away the nurses and emergency medical specialists around them. Well, they would have no choice but approach the trauma surgeons on call today, but otherwise, Lena was fairly appreciative of their attempts to stay away.

She licked her lips and finally drank the dark liquid that had become sustenance in the years since she'd passed her MCAT. An enthusiastic moan escaped her throat once she tasted the bittersweet liquid. Just the way she liked it. Doctors, they were one of a kind and they gotta stick together, as lots of people would say.

"You could have told me," Alex repeated, a somber twist to her lips. "I've been so worried about you."

The reaction was immediate, in which Lena's head snapped up so fast that it was kind of a miracle that she didn't need an ortho to fix it. She stared into the side of Alex's head, burning her gaze into the red hair. Inside, she didn't allow herself to well up at the words, to physically react in a way that would completely destroy her reputation in the hospital before she'd even begun to build one.

She swallowed thickly and cleared her throat loudly. At one point in her life, Alex Danvers had been one of her closest friends. They shared things in common. Hell, she met Kara through Alex, to the latter's utter disgust when she found out that she and Kara had been knocking boots. But then she signed her name the dotted line and walked away, and she didn't allow herself the privilege of keeping the people in her life too.

Divorces didn't work like that.

"I'm not married to Kara anymore," she said, as if Alex didn't already know that.

When she saw the look on Lena's face, Alex smiled sadly. "Come on," she whispered heavily. "You have to know that wasn't the only reason I cared about you."

"But you looked so angry just now. You kicked Sam to the guest room."

Alex nodded and shrugged. "I wasn't angry because you broke my sister's heart." Lena clenched her jaw at that. "I was angry because I spent all these years worrying about you, pretending that my wife wasn't still in touch with you. I was angry because you kicked me to the curb, as if I didn't mean anything after you and Kara fell apart."

The raven-haired woman didn't really have an explanation other than the fact that she was weak and she had been in a state of mind where any reminder of Kara would have been detrimental to her mental state. And Alex, out of all the people they had in common, was the starkest reminder of Kara Danvers.

"Alright," she muttered and fished for her phone. She opened up her contacts and went to the blocked list. "Wait, I forgot your number."

"How many people have you blocked?"

"It's not fun being a Luthor," Lena said, shaking her head. Alex looked at her with a combination of skepticism and disbelief. Lena rolled her eyes and pinched her nose with her free hand. "Believe it or not, I missed you too. Kara and Sam never really know what it's like to be in our shoes."

Alex scoffed and nodded in agreement. "That's true." She snatched Lena's phone and scrolled, cursing every few times because really, Lena had spent half her life blocking unwanted numbers – it really was a Luthor thing. "I'm kind of glad that I'm not born with your last name." Lena hummed. Alex made a victorious noise and tapped the phone a few times. "If you block me again, consider us enemies for life," she said, a little jokingly but also a little seriously.

Lena took her phone back and took a look at the screen, stopping as she read Alex's name. It had been three years since she had that name on her phone. And weird as it was, it felt good nonetheless. In no way was her life returning to before, but this…felt a bit like normalcy.

"You're not stone-cold," Alex announced.

They had both just finished their shifts. It was the crack ass of dawn and they were ready to go home; Alex to her wife, and Lena to her brand new but sparse apartment just a few blocks away. It wasn't embarrassing to change in front of each other; they'd seen one another at their worst, what with having interned at the same hospital before Alex moved away.

Lena made a perfunctory hum, not really listening, more focused on getting the grime out her teeth. One of the worst things about coffee. Alex made sure to make eye contact through the mirror, grave and heavy. Lena slowed down in brushing her teeth, perking her ears up for what would come next.

"I know you said things to each other. Divorced couples always do," the redhead began hesitantly. "I don't really know the details, but what I do know is that you're not stone-cold." She raised her brows, challenging Lena. "You're not."

"I did leave her."

"She left you first."

It was quiet, save for Lena's gargling and spitting it out. She rested her hands on the edges of the sink and almost rested her entire weight of it – it was sturdy enough not to crack under pressure. She watched the water swirl and swirl and swirl. Behind her, Alex was still staring at her.

They were in love. They were happy. And then they were not. Somewhere along their two-year marriage, Lena had grown exhausted and Kara had gotten distant. Somewhere along the lines, Lena figured there was no way she could stay in a marriage where she wasn't looked at anymore.

All this while, she thought no one ever did understand her point of view. Why she'd decided to file the papers and surprise everyone with them. She was just tired. She had always assumed that the blame was laid on her, giving up on their marriage.

Well, at least now she knew that Alex understood. That was a relief, because Kara did leave first.

Lena had never had a thing for the outdoors. The sun was too bright or the streets were too dark. The bugs were too annoying or the silence was too loud. The people were too happy or the passersby were too rude.

The point was that she had always preferred to stay indoors. To lounge on her couch and read the next book on her reading list. Watch the most pointless reality show on TV and pretend as if they were the best entertainment in the world. Make tea.

But after her first foray into the OR, after finally winning the opportunity to have her hands directly fixing the patient and feeling like she was contributing something to a bleak world, Lena had fostered a habit. Upon clocking off, she wouldn't go home. She would instead make her way to the nearest park and just…take a walk. Without any purpose.

Well, with one purpose. The rays of the sun would burn away the traces of blood on her hands, even though she'd washed it all away. The very things she didn't like about the outdoors would remind herself that not everyone was waiting to go to hospital to be operated on. They were still alive and healthy and she wouldn't have their blood on her hands.

Being a doctor wasn't without perks. The pay was good. The thrill was exciting. The Hippocratic Oath kept her on her toes. Sometimes though, a patient would pass away or worsen in their conditions, and she would be reminded that she wasn't a superhero. Lena was just a human being who had the skills to fix others to the best of her ability.

"Oh, hi."

Lena stopped and turned away from the children playing on the playground, though the sun had already set and the only illumination they had was the streetlamps. Kara was standing in front of her, hands stuck in her coat pockets and a dumbstruck expression on her face.

Lena imagined she looked the same.

"Hey," she gasped, blinking rapidly. "Wow, I haven't seen you in civilian clothing in so long."

"Well, it's been three years."

"It's been much longer than that."

It was true. In their last days together, when everything had gone from bad to worse, they'd only seen each other in passing, and Kara had always been in her uniform, albeit in Metropolis system. Hell, Kara hadn't even bothered to take off her uniform when they'd signed the papers, heading back to the station immediately after.

Sheepishly, hands reached up to adjust square-rimmed glasses. A lot of things about Kara had changed – her shape, her mannerisms, the fullness to her face. Those glasses remained the same. Somehow, Lena found comfort in that, as if it would have mattered at this point. Go figure.

"What are you doing here?" Lena asked.

"What? A girl can't even take walks now?" Kara teased.

Lena chuckled and joined Kara's side, starting to walk in the direction where she'd come from. "No, I just – you've never liked taking walks with me."

"But I still did."

"Yeah, but you didn't like it."

"I did."

Lena scoffed, shaking her head. For some reason, a sense of frustration began to rise in her chest. That seemed to be a pattern as well whenever they were in each other's presence. Even when they were saving that guy in the road accident, Lena had been frustrated, especially when Kara had asked for her credentials.

She didn't debate further though. After months and months of arguing with Kara, she knew that they would only both end up walking away and freezing each other out. And tonight, Lena was too tired to even bother. Honestly, she should have just said hi and went about her way. She didn't know why she'd chosen to walk by Kara's side to a direction where her place was definitely not.

"I picked up on it," Kara muttered, playing with her glasses again. "I came to National City and I just – one day, I just found myself coming here and walking after work. And I never stopped."

A heartbeat. "Funny," Lena deadpanned. "You used to show me exactly how much you disliked it whenever I made you do it with me."

"That's not fair. I was tired and I wanted to stay home."

"You were always tired," Lena spat out, letting the frustration get the better of her. They had both stopped in their steps. "That's the thing, Kara. You were always tired. Tired from your job. Tired of having to do chores. Tired of being in that house. Tired of me."

Kara swiveled to face her, her mouth opened, like she had a litany of angry words to throw back in Lena's face. But then something stopped her, maybe something on Lena's face – honestly, Lena didn't know.

She had stopped knowing anything about Kara a long time ago, despite having been one of the few people who knew to read Kara best.

"I did love you," Kara settled, coming out low and weak.

Another heartbeat. Lena hated it. She hated how Kara hadn't been in her life for three whole fucking years and yet, her heart still wanted to beat for her in the most random of moments. She hated that after three fucking years, she still couldn't get herself to completely hate her ex-wife, even though she'd read a lot of books how that was common between divorced couples.

"I know you did. But somewhere along the way, you got tired of even that," Lena whispered back, losing the vitriol from earlier. She sighed and shook her head. "Enjoy your walk, Kara. I'm gonna find another park."

She made herself walk away. Her dignity had been a lost cause in the course of their relationship. But now that she'd picked herself up and got on with her life, she refused to lose it once again front of the same woman who'd taken it away from her in the first place.

Chapter Text

"Don't hate her."

"What?"

Kara played with the label of her beer bottle, tearing it off fraction by fraction, letting the moisture help out a bit in the process. She refrained from shooting pleading looks at her sister, choosing instead to focus on the diminishing logo of the horrible draft beer that Alex was unusually fond of.

It was a good thing that the fire escape was barely lit in the night, so her sister wouldn't be able to read her so easily. Sam was inside, showering off a day of grime and sweat. Instead of washing herself off as well, Kara had liberated a bottle of beer from the fridge and sat on the fire escape, joined by Alex not so long later.

"Don't hate her," she repeated, lifting the beer to her lips and taking a healthy gulp.

Alex was quiet for a moment, studying Kara's profile. "Is that a request or a declaration?"

At that, Kara could only smirk sardonically. No humor whatsoever. She leaned against the railing and rested the bottle against her forehead, condensation gathering on her skin. "Request. Declaration. Both," she corrected, squinting at herself and shrugging. "I don't know. Is there a difference? Is it important?" She clenched her jaw. "I saw her."

"Yeah, I know."

Kara shook her head and cleared her throat, fiddling with the label once more. "No, I saw her again. Two days ago."

"Where?"

"The park."

A pause, and then, "Oh."

Because Alex and Sam – and James and Lucy – were the only ones who knew about the shared habit – well, not exactly shared, more like a habit that Kara inexplicably picked up after the divorce. Their colleagues knew that Kara liked to take a walk in the park after work, but none of them really knew why. They just saw it as it was.

She liked to lie to herself and say that she didn't know why she'd picked up the habit. But late in the night, when she was lying in her giant bed alone, the left side cold and empty, she would be honest with herself.

Five stages of grief. Five stages of the emotional turmoil she'd gone through to grieve her failed marriage to a woman she'd loved with her whole heart. Five stages of heartache at the understanding that she'd given her heart to Lena Luthor and there really was no way of her ever loving anyone else the same way again.

In the beginning she couldn't make herself go back to a barren apartment without a wife, the wife she'd left behind in Metropolis – denial. After that, she just kept walking, because she and Lena had so many arguments over her sullenness whenever she relented to Lena's pestering, so here she was, walking – anger. Subsequently, her feet took her to the park, and part of her was thinking that if she could just keep walking, maybe Lena would be able to see and she would come back – bargaining. And then, she realized that if she went home, maybe she would down a whole bottle of sleeping pills or drink a whole carton of beer and that just wouldn't do, so she took herself out to the park and forced herself to see people – depression.

Finally, it dawned on her that Lena was truly gone. She'd uprooted her life and moved here to National City, and Lena stayed in Metropolis. That didn't stop her from walking though; she kept at it, because what else could she do? At least this way, she could pretend that the shadow grip on her bicep was real and the deep chuckles weren't imaginations. Acceptance.

"She hates me," Kara said, distinctly remembering what it was like to see Lena at the park. She could hear the shrillness of Lena's voice as she yelled at Kara. "Can't say I blame her."

"I could never hate her. Lena's a good egg," Alex announced. "Do you hate her?"

Kara chuckled darkly and drank more beer. "I couldn't hate her if I tried," she replied and lifted her shoulders in a shrug. Not even in her angriest moment could Kara bring herself to hate Lena. "Do you think I got tired of loving her?" she asked, frowning deeply at the thought, at the words that kept bouncing around in her head.

Alex pondered the question for a long moment. So long that Kara figured her sister had fallen asleep, but she didn't turn around. She just stared at the apartment building on the opposite side of the building, watching a family playing Monopoly through the window.

"I think –" Alex started, a hint of hesitation in her enunciation "– that you two could have tried a little harder." Kara tightened her grip on the railing, the rust staining her palm. "You didn't get tired of loving her, Kara. You got tired of trying to convince her that you do."

Her mother – birth mother, that was – didn't have a loving relationship with her father. They both came from families that prioritized benefits over feelings, and any offspring was only pawns for them to trade for more benefits. Unfortunately for Alura and Jordan, they were born into those families and had no free will to dictate who they were going to spend the rest of their lives with.

Kara knew that her parents had never truly loved each other, but they were best friends. The best of friends, attached at the hip and never without the other. Alura had a butler to love her faithfully, and Jordan had a string of girlfriends who had to sign NDAs whenever they walked out the door. The marriage wasn't what they wanted, but they worked with it.

Even when they'd died – a hit-and-run, and they never caught the perpetrator – the authorities found them holding hands, because they may not have been in love, but they loved each other deeply.

Kara had never really looked towards them for relationship advice; they weren't exactly in a position to tell her how to maintain passion and adoration in a relationship, much less a marriage. But she bore witness to the interactions between Alura and their butler, and somehow, even in her youth, she comprehended that those two were really in love.

It was at a dinner. Jordan had gone off to Uzbekistan for a business meeting, so it was just her and Alura, the butler standing just by the door, loyally waiting for his mistress to finish her meal.

"How do you know you're really in love?" Kara had asked, drinking the hot chocolate that the chef had made for her.

Alura threw a knowing glance at her lover, who smiled indulgingly. "You'll know, Kara. One day, you'll meet someone, handsome or beautiful, and you'll think that they're the most radiant being on the face of the planet. And you'll know that…it's them. You're gonna spend the rest of your life loving them."

In the time that Kara had spent with her parents, they'd imparted many advices to her, but this was one that Kara kept with her. She went about her life. Got adopted by the Danvers. Learned a new way of life that didn't involve butlers or maids. Found a passion in fires and being on the frontlines.

And she kept that advice in her heart. Listening to her when she felt the loneliest. Trusting that she wouldn't fall into the trap that her parents did. Believing that one day, she would find the most radiant being on the planet.

And one day, she believed she did. Mid-August when she was 20, not really winter but not really autumn either. Torrents of rain that had just gone on and on and on. It was a miracle that Metropolis didn't flood under the torrential attack.

Kara had found refuge under the awning of a bus stop because she'd forgotten an umbrella in her rush to class that morning. It had been times like these that she wished her sister had stayed in Metropolis, who'd be able to come fetch her home. The awning didn't help much either, because the rain was heavy and there were holes and Kara had to really make herself as small as possible so she wouldn't get wet.

"Where are you headed to?" That voice brought shudders down Kara's eardrums and then past her nerve ends, setting fire that she didn't know she would never be able to put out.

And when she looked up, there it was. The most radiant being on the face of the planet, holding an umbrella over their heads to block off the rain that slipped past the holes in the awning. Bare makeup but vibrant red lipstick. Briefly, the blonde wondered what it would be like to kiss those lips and touch those locks.

"I – um, McKinley building," she muttered, but forced herself to be loud enough to surpass the roar of the rain.

"I'll walk you there."

Kara blinked, thinking that the droplets on her glasses were fooling her, and that this was just a hallucination. Alura had to be lying and it was simply impossible for a girl like this to exist in a world like this. "Are you – you're serious?"

The girl's brows rose; it would have been scary if not for the smile on her lips as well, bemused and teasing. "I wouldn't be standing here, risking my umbrella being torn to pieces, if I weren't sure," she said, and it sounded so warm that the coldness of the weather was nearly nullified.

Kara stood up, dried off her glasses on her jacket sleeve, and picked up her stuff, nodding enthusiastically all the way. "Let me…" she murmured, drifting off as her fingers wrapped around the handle of the umbrella and holding it. "It's the least I could do." She licked her lips and allowed a moment to be struck by the eyes that locked onto her. "I'm – I'm Kara."

The girl nodded and introduced herself, "Lena. I wish we'd met under better circumstances."

"I'd say this is perfect," Kara opinionated as they started walking in the direction of her dorm.

The next twenty minutes had been spent avoiding getting splashed by cars and chatting about their classes at NCU. Kara had been grateful that her hands were occupied – one with her laptop and books, and the other with the umbrella – because otherwise, she wouldn't have stopped herself from wrapping an arm around Lena.

But she knew, right then, at just 20 years old, that she was going to marry this girl, the most radiant being on the face of the planet. Alura was right in that sense – she did know that it was Lena, she just didn't know that it wouldn't be for the rest of her life.

What would possess a group of teenagers to pour liquid nitrogen into a house pool? Actually, what would possess a group of teenagers with barely a mature brain to purchase a container of liquid nitrogen in the first place? And what would possess a group of teenagers to jump into said liquid-nitrogen-pool when basic chemistry in schools taught them explicitly not to mess around with liquid nitrogen?

Collective idiocy, Lucy had deduced. And Kara wasn't usually a mean person. She was rather kind and openminded, as a majority of Station 15 would agree with. She wasn't judgemental at all and she liked giving people the benefit of the doubt.

But this time around, there just was no room of benefit for any doubt to given. Collective idiocy, it was as simple as that. When a group of stupid teenagers came together, they would form one big stupid brain, and they would do hugely stupid things, like pouring a vat of liquid nitrogen into a pool and thinking it would go well at all.

"I regret ever persuading the Battalion Chief to let you into my station," Sam complained, checking Kara's vitals and wrapping a bazillion towels around her to fight the coldness from leaping into the pool.

"Kind of didn't have a choice," Kara stuttered between rattling teeth, because god, it was so cold. "I'm a firefighter, remember? It's my job to save people at the expense of my own life," she continued, still stuttering. "Even when they were exceptionally stupid," she added, deliberately louder so the teenagers could hear her while panicking over their friends who'd nearly frozen to death in liquid nitrogen.

She usually wasn't so mean, but in her defense, she had just leaped into the pool to rescue a teenager who'd asphyxiated from excess liquid nitrogen. And now here she sat, freezing her ass off and kind of still fighting to even do the basic human function. Breathing. Her lungs felt compressed with every intake and suffocated with every exhale.

"You're talking a lot for someone who nearly suffocated," Sam grumbled and picked her up, loading her into the back of the aid car with the teenager who had passed out again. "Do not come back to the station unless you're cleared by the professionals."

"I am a professional."

"You're a paramedic. You can't even do a surgery. Be quiet and let a proper doctor check you out," Sam retorted, pointing a meaningful finger in her direction.

The lieutenant would have protested if it wasn't for the fatigue that gripped her bones and never let go. She sat by the teenager with Barry driving the aid car, and she very lamely glared at the kid, wondering how stupid one could be to do something like this and where the hell her parents had been.

Somehow, she ended up sitting in front of none other than Lena Luthor on a bed in the emergency ward. She didn't know she got here – maybe the liquid nitrogen was really getting to her head. But when she finally regained awareness of her surrounding, her ex-wife was there, sitting on a stool in front of her, curtains drawn around them.

"Um," she mumbled, blurry vision locked onto her ex-wife's name tag and nothing else.

"Welcome back," Lena replied, a mild but playful smile on her lips. "I need you to…" She gestured at Kara's uniform and held up the chest piece of her stethoscope.

"Oh, right."

Weakly and breathlessly, Kara began her efforts to peel off the uniform. She would have asked for Lena's help three years ago, but this wasn't three years ago. It took some time, but she eventually got down to her shirt and lifted it enough for Lena to reach her sternum. If she had a clearer head, she wouldn't have missed out on the way the doctor balked slightly at seeing her abs.

A hiss escaped her lips when Lena's fingers inevitably contacted her skin. "Still cold hands," she complained with a grimace.

Lena only hummed in response and listened to Kara's heartbeat. There once was a time when she would only need to lay her head on Kara's chest to do so, but again, this wasn't three years ago.

This was the way they worked, one of the reasons that Lucy had always touted as the pillar of their relationship. How they complemented each other with their differing body temperatures, one exceedingly warm and one abnormally cold. Kara kind of forgot about all that in the three years they'd been divorced.

"Lungs sound normal. You do seem really tired. I'm gonna order a CT scan just to be sure," Lena said after she'd done all the tapping and shining. "Sam texted me earlier." Kara groaned, and Lena smiled mischievously. "It's my professional opinion that you rest here for the rest of the day until someone from the station or your sister comes to pick you up."

"My boss and my ex-wife conspiring against me. Why didn't I see that coming?"

"The liquid nitrogen, perhaps. I'm gonna prescribe you some oxygen in the meantime, just to get sufficient blood back to your brain." Kara nodded in acquiescence. "There'll be an intern watching you at all times, so don't even think about escaping."

"You're horrible."

"Yes, you've told me that once or twice."

Kara's eyes snapped up to find green ones locked on her. A combination of amusement and recollection of painful memories. Gone was the animosity from the park, when Lena had seemed like she would explode from the emotions pent up in her at the idea of Kara picking up a habit that she'd assumed Kara hated. Right now, they were both just here, two ex-wives in the same city as one another, and they couldn't do anything about it.

She sighed, too tired to even explain herself in a situation like this. Besides, what good would explaining anything do for her in current circumstances?

"Is that the same stethoscope?" she asked, pointing at the object hanging around Lena's neck.

"And what if it was?"

"I'm proud of you. I don't think I ever got to tell you that."

Her ex-wife didn't speak a word for the next few moments, still situated by the curtain. They eyed one another, so much history filling up the small confinements that would air out once the curtain was drawn back.

"I suppose we were both too resentful of each other's careers to feel proud of anything," Lena relented, grip tightening on the cloth. "I'm proud of you too, Lieutenant Danvers." They smiled at each other. "Now, rest well, Lieutenant. Otherwise, a certain Dr. Danvers in this hospital will strangle you for disobeying a doctor's orders."

Despite the stress on her lungs and the sleepiness overtaking her eyelids, Kara still managed a laugh at the added remark, and she fell asleep to the small grin that Lena had sent her way before leaving the bay.

Five hours. She slept five hours. The emergency ward was always busy and the intercom never really stayed quiet. Kara, however, kept sleeping for five hours. She would have kept sleeping if it wasn't for Alex nearly pouring water in her face to wake her up. Alex, who also looked pretty unhappy, glass of water firmly gripped in her hand, and not dressed up in her scrubs and white coat.

"Why couldn't you have stayed on the path of journalism?" were the first words out of Alex's mouth once Kara had regained enough consciousness to sit up straight.

Kara chuckled and rubbed the slumber out of her eyes. "Well, the apartment building opposite my dorm went on fire once –"

"Yeah, I know the story," Alex snapped, depositing the glass on the bedside table. She grabbed Kara's forearm and gently hauled her off the bed. "Come on. I'm taking you home." She helped her sister into her jacket, folding up her jacket over her arm. "You're sleeping in the guest room. I'm not letting you go home alone."

"What – Lena said I'm fine. My CT scan was fine."

"Liquid nitrogen, Kara. I'm gonna make you dinner and you're gonna sleep in the guest room. End of story."

"Dictator."

"Do you want me to call mom?"

That shut Kara up right there. She hustled out of the hospital, half supported by Alex. The car ride was quiet, filled up only with Taylor Swift's latest album. One of the proudest moments in Kara's life would be her success in convincing Alex that Taylor Swift was one of the best song artists of all time.

She almost dozed back to sleep a couple of times during the ride, woken up by Alex's interrupting coughs. She wanted to hate her sister for it, but part of her was also grateful, because if she kept sleeping, she wouldn't be able to sleep tonight. And liquid nitrogen or not, a woman still gotta go to work in the morning to earn her keep.

When they entered Alex's apartment, Kara realized that James and Lucy had also joined them. The former preparing dinner with Sam while the latter just enjoying the booze, waiting to be fed. She blinked at the sight of her old friends, but welcomed their cheers and subsequent hugs to her survival.

She took her time showering, lathering every inch of her body with soap and shampoo to wash away the chemicals that must have clung to her body throughout the day. The heat of the shower was temptation itself, calling for her to just stay there under its violent but soothing beat.

And when she closed her eyes, green eyes emerged, electrifying and hardly kind. It had been three years, but she could recall every single fleck of gunmetal that floated among the jade. It was a damning thing, really, to have all these memories come back to her after three years of not thinking about the divorce paper laminated in the back of her drawer. If she could ever hate Lena, it would be because the woman had never really found the will to leave her mind.

She heaved a sigh, crediting the thoughts to the mist, and got out of the shower. Patted herself dry. Put on some clothes that she'd left behind in her sister's guest room. Rubbed away any lingering makeup. Went outside. Froze in her steps.

"Lena."

The doctor removed herself from James' embrace, bright smile on her lips and a hint of tears in her eyes. "Hey, Kara. How are you feeling?"

"I – um, fine. Feeling much better," she stammered, throwing a minute glare at her sister before looking back to her ex-wife. "Right. You're here." Lena nodded in affirmation. "Right," Kara murmured, clearing her throat.

This was…weird. It was one thing to meet again due to a car accident. One thing to approach Lena herself that night at the park, which really didn't do much to clear the foggy air between them. One thing to run into Lena at the hospital and the park and the hospital again. Those were all accidents. Pranks that the universe had pulled on her just for shits and giggles.

This, however, was clearly orchestrated. There was no way that Sam and Alex would just bring people home without informing another, especially not Lena. For all Kara knew, Alex was probably the one who invited Lena over for dinner.

Just moments ago, she had been imagining Lena in the shower. Not that the rest of them knew that, but for some reason, Kara felt a smidge of guilt at the idea. She shouldn't be imagining Lena in any scenario at all, not when they'd taken off the rings and got out of each other's lives for good.

Clearly sensing the awkwardness that permeated the room, Lucy took Lena's arm and dragged her to the living room to catch up. While James and Sam were busy making dinner, Kara took the opportunity to drag her own sister back into the guest room, locking the door for good measure.

"I can explain."

"Then explain."

Alex hummed, doubtful. "Not now, though." Kara frowned. "Sam and I have a legitimate reason to do this. Trust me." Kara raised her brows, silently questioning Alex's instruction. "You'll know later."

"You couldn't have warned me?"

"I didn't wanna put too much stress on you after you'd just woken up."

"Well, I'm plenty stressed, regardless."

The redhead placed her hands on Kara's arms, squeezing. Perhaps she meant it reassuringly, but all Kara felt was a squeeze and an irrational peak in her chest, because there was a woman out there giving her the most confusing emotion roller-coaster that she'd ever been through in her life, and she just wanted to have dinner and get some sleep and go to work tomorrow.

This day was not going well for her at all. Half of her wanted to isolate herself out on the fire escape and drink a couple bottles of Bud Light before calling it a night, pretending that Lena wasn't near her in a social capacity, in a room filled with people who used to see them as the sappiest couple they'd ever seen in their lives.

Sure, it had been…nice to see Lena again earlier today. The past few times they saw each other had been entirely too filled with past grievances and emotions for them to be able to be calm in one another's presence. She didn't blame Lena for blowing up at her in the park at all. Or herself for blowing up at Lena the first night they'd seen each other again. They both had things to say and they managed to get at least some of them of their chests.

And earlier had been…cordial. They were talking and even joking with another. Kara wasn't totally blind to the fact that the air wasn't completely cleared, but it felt like a step. And if they were gonna be in the same city hanging in the same social circles, baby steps were always welcomed.

Except she hadn't expected to go from a professional setting to a casual one so fast.

There was simply no time to prepare. Brace herself for the eventual integration of their lives, professionally or socially.

Once upon a time, she would have walked out of the room and wrapped her arms around Lena without anything stopping her. This time around, she would be walking out of the room, nodding at Lena, and keeping her hands firmly in the pockets of her sweatpants. Impulses were a damned thing, and after Lena had left, let's just say that Kara's impulse control had dropped immensely.

Chapter Text

Here was the thing about having once been married to and divorced from a firefighter: the fear never really subsided. Subsiding was never an option, because caring for someone didn't just disappear overnight, certainly not just because she'd scribbled her initials over the dotted line and walked away.

Over the last three years, while Kara Danvers had faded, she wasn't completely transparent. At least once a day, Lena would wonder. Even though she'd built up a decent resistance to asking for information about the blonde from Sam, she still wondered. Kara's face floated in her mind, and she would always wonder.

Was Kara still alive? Was she doing okay? Did she eat as well as she used to when they were two sappy people happily in love, never fathoming the idea that they would fall out of love one day in the future?

Was Kara happy?

And when she saw Kara wrapped up in a woolen blanket, seated in the back of the aid car, Lena felt it again. The anxiety and fear that always came with caring for a firefighter. In her head, she could see it – a condominium building alight with fire, a shop lot filled up with smoke, and something or other. She hadn't ever imagined a pool of liquid nitrogen per se, but Lena was smart enough to at least comprehend that Kara must have done something foolish in line of her job.

For example, jumping into said pool to rescue a stupid teenager.

It took immense effort to not descend into the state of a hysterical ex-wife. Compose herself and become the best doctor that she had always been. Two interns were directed to deposit Kara in the chair, and without even acknowledging the look that Alex had been sending her, Lena rolled her ex-wife to an emergency bay, pulling the curtains to make sure that no one interrupted.

She was cold. Composed. Even friendly to a point. But all the while, she wondered. Why was she still so afraid?

"I heard you treated Kara."

"I was available."

"You okay?"

Lena sat in her office, having finished her round in the ER and returned to the neurology wing to…specialize. In thirty minutes, she had to operate on a kid with a benign brain tumor that could turn malignant if it wasn't extracted immediately. The tumor was minuscule, but spread around nerve ends that no common neurosurgeon would touch it.

Not Lena. The raven-haired woman relished in this sort of things, challenge and ingenious. It wasn't that Lena liked to brag; her brother did that enough for her. No, Lena wasn't doing it for bragging rights; she was doing it to save a child's life, and because she could. She may very well be the only one in this whole damn country who could. The fact that it would put her on the front pages of some medical magazines didn't hurt either.

And yet. And yet, Lena couldn't stop thinking about her. The woman who was resting away in the ER, not a care in the world, unknowing the turmoil she had wrought in Lena's brain just for putting herself in danger, like she always did.

"Always," she replied, playing with her scrub cap, refusing to acknowledge its origin. "I've never been not okay."

Sam hummed. "That's what I'm afraid of."

Lena rolled her eyes. "Just because you're married to a Danvers doesn't mean you get to be dramatic too," she drawled.

"You were married to one too."

Fingers stopped, hovering over the frayed strings. Lena had repaired the cap many times over the past three years, but she had never had the heart to toss it away. Just like the stethoscope, it was a reminder of love. Once upon a time, she had had a taste of enormous, great love, however short-lived it had been.

"Come to my place tonight. I'm cooking."

"Why?"

"Just come."

"Will Kara be there?"

Sam hesitated. Then, "Yes."

The door to her office opened, and in came the head of one of the residents, who would assist in the surgery. Lena held up a hand with a nod and stood up from her chair. Inside, she was grateful to Sam for always being honest with her, even if it would scare Lena away.

"Text me the details."

Without a word of goodbye, the red button was pressed and the phone was tossed into a drawer. Lena walked out of her office, wearing a scrub cap patterned with clouds and adorable little bears. No Luthor would ever be caught dead wearing something like that, and Lena wouldn't have either, until her ex-wife had gifted it to her during the white coat ceremony.

But still, regardless of the cute scrub cap or the lingering presence of the blonde just a few floors away, Lena tucked them all into little boxes. Mind palaces were good for these things. She had a kid to save, after all.

Kara was expected. In fact, Lena had spent about thirty minutes pacing in her office – thirty minutes after her shift – second guessing her decision to agree to Sam's invitation so quickly, because she'd expected Kara to be there. Sam had pretty much confirmed it, and she didn't imagine Alex had changed much from the overly concerned older sister that she'd been before they parted ways.

One message from Sam, gentle but insistent, became the lightning rod that pushed her out the doors and into a cab. Headed for Alston Avenue, where a nondescript apartment building housing the Arias-Danvers was located. Her nerves wrought with tension and anxiety, but her legs found their way inside the elevator and down the hallway. Her hand was even strong enough to form three firm knocks on the heavy wooden door.

All with the expectation that Kara Danvers would be there.

What she hadn't expected was the sight of her old friends, all gathered in the kitchen, bright smiles and reminiscent eyes directed at her. Warm and scared all over again.

"My god, Luthor, do you age?" Lucy demanded, a blinding grin stretching her lips as she lounged on the stool and twirled a bottle of beer in her hands.

"It's really good to see you again, Lena," James said warmly as he didn't even hesitate to tug Lena into a bear hug that he was famous for, all encompassing and safe.

Three years ago, she'd walked away from Kara, and these people by extension. Call her cold-hearted, call her heartless even, but she genuinely thought it was the best decision she could make for her own wellbeing. Alex, James, and Lucy were all strings, complicated and immensely entangled with the reddest string in her life.

It perhaps wouldn't be an overstatement to say that people might find easier to disentangle cable cords than the lives of the Danvers and co. And Lena loved them, like a person would love anyone who'd been there for them throughout their youth and served as pillars so strong that they could just lean on them without worrying of hurting worse.

But at the end of the day, Lena had to get away. She had to cut off all ties and hide in Ireland for a month to heal the wounds of being left behind the one person she loved most, and she couldn't do that if she had to see them – all stark and blinding reminders of how they were all there to witness the buildup and downfall of her marriage.

She hadn't seen them in three years. She'd thought they would have grown to hate her for being so ruthless. But here she was, welcomed so warmly, like not a day had passed.

There simply was no helping the way her eyes welled up immediately upon James' embrace. Not bothering to hide the way she didn't hesitate to wrap her own arms around his big posture and taking it all in as much as she could, embarrassing as it looked.

"It's really good to see you too," she whispered, breathing in the musky aftershave that he'd been using since college.

"Lena."

The doctor momentarily froze in James' arms before making herself retreat from his embrace, turning her eyes to the blonde firefighter frozen in the hallway. Reluctant smile pulled on her lips.

Lena asked Kara how she was, because it was the ethical thing to do, and because she also really wanted to know. She'd been wondering the moment she learned that Alex had turned up to bring Kara home. There was relief in seeing the fuzziness gone from Kara's eyes and that she was standing upright and steady. Lena didn't wanna think about what that meant.

"We're adopting," Alex announced after serving the dessert, holding tightly to Sam's hand on the tabletop, bright smile on her face.

She looked happy. They both did.

"That's why we asked you to dinner. We wanted to tell you first," Alex continued, her eyes darting between all of them, sort of in a panic.

Kara's silverware dropped, clattering all over the place. Fork on the floor. Spoon hanging in the air. Vanilla ice cream dripping on her sweatpants. It was just a mess. But Kara didn't seem to care. Simply gaped at her sister and sister-in-law. And extraordinarily, expression completely unreadable.

To be fair, Lena was feeling just about the same. Her face was stony, but her eyes locked onto her best friend. Her usually busy brain, always muddling with medical theories and extraordinary methods to save brains, was unusually quiet. Came to a sudden halt with a loud screech. Wheels just stopped turning.

Seeing the shocked silence of the two of them, Lucy seemed to have decided to jump into the fray, asking, "Does Eliza know?"

"We're calling her tomorrow," Alex replied.

"What do you need us to do?" James asked.

"Just be here for us. God knows we're gonna need all the support we can get."

And then they faded into silence again. At this point, all eyes had turned to Lena and Kara, wary and anticipatory. Thus far, the two of them were the only ones who hadn't said a word, one gaping at her sister and one staring at her best friend. They were all very important people in each other's lives, but these four especially.

Attached at the hips before they met their partners – or former partner. And then attached at the hips once more, only four of them together. Three years ago, no one would have thought that they could be split apart, until one of them splintered and ran away.

Then at the same time, Lena and Kara jumped to their feet, still wordless. Lena rounded the table to Sam, Kara rounded the table to Alex, and they hugged the couple, because that was all they could do. She wasn't sure about Kara, but that was all Lena wanted to do at this moment, for giving her this gift that she had never fathomed in her entire life.

"I love you," Sam muttered in her ear, wholeheartedly accepting Lena's rarely enthusiastic hug.

Lena hummed, too choked up to even say anything. She couldn't say anything. She could only hug her best friend and be happy for her.

A week ago, the agency had contacted the Danvers-Arias and informed them of a child they thought would be suitable for the couple. A five-year-old orphan, who'd rotated between a few foster houses for the past year after her parents had unfortunately passed away in a plane crash. A little girl named Ruby, who had an affinity for purple and looked like she had the fullest cheeks on the face of the planet, based on the photos Sam had shown them.

And in about a month, Lena was gonna be an aunt. To a little girl, who would most assuredly have the most protective and adoring family on earth, because there was no way Auntie Lena would ever let Ruby go a day without knowing that she was loved, orphan or not. Neither would Auntie Kara. Their childhoods simply wouldn't allow them to.

Still though, Lena still needed to parse it all. Process the words and images. Completely absorb the idea and the fact of a niece coming her way. So even though the sky had started to pour in the night, blurring out the city and making lives just a tad more dangerous for the flimsy human beings below, Lena still stubbornly climbed out to the fire escape, holding onto a bottle of beer like her life depended on it.

"It's raining."

"Yes, I'm aware."

Raindrops pattered on her legs as she sat with the appendages hanging out the edge. She would say she liked the riskiness of it all if not for the railing that would keep her safe. Plus, a firefighter had come out to join her, so she couldn't be safer, really.

When Kara joined her, though keeping a certain distance between them so they wouldn't touch, Lena couldn't help but remark, "It's raining."

"Yes, but I'm a firefighter. I'm like immune to this kind of stuff."

"Remember that time when you got sick because you were stuck under the rain for hours, trying to save a cat from a tree?"

"I was building my immunity then."

"Remember when you jumped into liquid nitrogen this morning?"

"That's not rain. That's actual poison."

Lena chuckled, shaking her head and sipping more of her beer. Her eyes roved over to Kara, taking in her profile and comparing the smile on the blonde's face to the smile etched in her memories. Nothing much had changed, but for the fact that Kara had definitely gotten bulkier over the years and her smile had dimmed slightly.

The doctor didn't want to fathom the idea that their divorce could be the cause of that dimmer smile. Not exactly dark, but the room was certainly not as bright as it used to be in the presence of that smile. Lena used to live for it, doing all the silly things just so she could see it. How silly of her. How naïve. How utterly and desolately young.

In the living room behind them, James and Lucy were still fawning over the album that Sam and Alex had gathered on a little girl that they'd only ever met once. Laughing and shrieking and sometimes crying. That would probably go on for hours, never mind that they all still had jobs to do in the morning to earn their keep; to take care of an adopted child.

"You're gonna be an aunt," Lena offered. "Congratulations."

"So will you," Kara replied good-naturedly. "So congratulations to you too."

Their bottles came together, clinking nicely, muffled only by the pouring rain, still pattering all over the city.

"Look at us."

"Two divorcees, about to be an aunt to the same little girl."

Few seconds passed. Honks and shrieks permeated the air, alongside chatters and laughter from inside the apartment they'd escaped. And then the two women hanging on the fire escape burst into their own bout of laughter. The kind that could tear apart your stomachs and bring tears to your eyes, because good lord, the fucking irony.

What was funny was that ironic as it was, there was nothing weird about this. Basic familiarity boiled down to the very essence of it – two women, who used to be inseparable, having a laugh, like old maidens in an old folks' home, because life was just fucked like that. Lena should have never doubted its tendency to take a shit on everything just to see which idiot would step on it, and she was the idiot this time around when she made the decision to move to National City once and for all.

The thing was that she had even knowingly stepped into that pile of shit.

For a genius, Lena certainly hadn't been showing much of her prowess when she decided that.

"Is everything okay?"

Both of them simultaneously turned back to find that Sam had poked her head out, cautiously eyeing them both, as if they were teenagers about to head into the nearest Walmart to buy the cheapest vat of liquid nitrogen themselves. Not that Lena could blame her. She didn't ever think that she would one day be sitting next to her ex-wife and laughing with her either.

"We're fine, Sam," Kara reassured.

Only marginally relieved, the brunette averted her gaze to Lena, curiosity and caution perpetual. Perhaps in the next fifteen minutes, she and Kara would come to loggerheads again. For some reason though, the rain and the dampness of the air added a sense of safety. Or maybe it was just Kara.

As such, Lena only nodded to Sam's quiet question, a form of reassurance so her best friend would return to fawning over a new baby girl. The chatter from inside was muffled again when Sam closed the window shut, leaving her alone with her ex-wife again. Lena didn't hate it; she didn't feel an immediate urge to get the hell out of dodge and congratulate her best friend when they would finally be alone.

"Can I confess something?" Kara asked, snatching Lena's beer and taking a sip herself.

"Go ahead."

"I miss this."

Lena blinked, a crevice at the bridge of her nose. Gently, she took the bottle back and just…gulped, because what could she really say to that abrupt confession?

"Alex is great and all. I love talking to her; she's my best friend, you know," Kara rattled on, hands grasping the air, like trying to catch the rain in her grip. Alas, it slipped, like how Lena had slipped three years ago. "But you and I…" she drifted off, squinting at the building opposite them. "I don't know how to describe it, but it's different. And I miss it. I miss you."

Breathing stuttered. Chest stammering. Lena was surprised her hand didn't tremble as she deposited the now empty beer bottle next to her, susceptible to the strong wind that would topple it anytime. The temperature had dropped tremendously, even though it was hardly autumn, and yet, Lena felt hot.

Just all over. Eating the nerve endings that made up the structure of her, almost like each syllable that Kara had spoken was intended to burn her to the very core of her soul, the very insides of her hidden personality that no one had ever seen but Kara Danvers.

She didn't know where to look. Staring at the family in the opposite building would constitute as stalking if she kept it up. The rain was amplified only by the streetlamps, not a single drop to be focused on as it dripped and dripped and dripped. She desperately yearned to head inside and grab another beer, or maybe something stronger, but something told her that she had to sit here for this, or everything would come crashing down…again.

She didn't know where to look, so she looked at Kara.

"You stopped loving me," she said, weak and fragile with the only person she could be weak and fragile with.

Kara chuckled sardonically. "I didn't stop loving you, Lena," she replied, sounding tired at having to explain. "I stopped convincing you that I loved you. There's a difference," she added. When Lena frowned deeper, she continued, "You didn't like that I was out there, risking my life to save others' lives. On top of that, I was studying to be a paramedic, while also getting a diploma in fire science. You were convinced that I was taking on all these things to avoid being at home with you. You were convinced that me going out there meant that I didn't love you enough to stay alive for you."

"You can hardly blame me."

"I don't. I was at fault too."

"I was going to bed alone. Almost every night. And if not, I come home in the morning and you're walking out the door. I go on walks and you're grumbling about having to spend more time outdoors. You stopped looking at me."

"And you kept looking for me. I know." Kara scratched at the back of her neck, hesitating, but eventually, she shifted closer to Lena, though they still didn't touch, as if she knew that the conversation didn't warrant touching. "I know, Lena, and I'm sorry for all the hurt I've caused you. I really am."

One of her arms extended in Lena's direction, but then stopped, hanging in the air, before retracting back to the railing. It was then that Lena realized she'd been crying. The alcohol had been fuzzy enough that she didn't realize this until Kara's hesitation in wiping the tears away.

Lena reached up to wipe them away, only for the traces to be replaced by new tears. She sniffled and cleared her throat, as if it was enough to wipe away the emotions that welled up in her. Emotions that she'd been keeping at bay since that first time she saw her ex-wife again in three years, and in an intense situation no less. Life had always had a knack for the dramatic for her.

"You weren't totally innocent too," Kara said.

While Lena had never liked being wrong, she knew that Kara was right too. "Yeah, I know."

"Could have talked to me, you know. Forced me to listen to you. You're very good at that."

"A human being needs fiber to be healthy, Kara."

"Kale is disgusting."

"This is why we're divorced."

Kara burst out laughing. Hearty and ringing in the most pleasurable way. She had a good laugh. "We were good," she commented once she sobered up. "I'm sorry that I didn't appreciate you enough for you to stay. I'm sorry that I left before I even realized I did. I'm really sorry, Lena."

Lena nodded, accepting the apology. She hadn't realized that she'd been waiting for it since the divorce, until now, when the words finally left Kara's mouth, sincere and wholehearted. She made the first move and reached out to clasp her hand over Kara's, trying not to think about the familiar skin, filled with callouses and traced all over with the years of being a frontliner.

"I'm sorry too," she whispered.

The blonde hummed, accepting too. "Can we be friends?"

"Yes, Kara, we can be friends."

The grin on Kara's face was enough to soothe the hurt that still lingered in Lena's chest. It was a good grin. Kara had always had that with her – the very first things that attracted Lena to her in the first place. Lena couldn't remember how she survived the last three years without hearing that laugh and seeing that smile.

Kara (5:34 p.m.): nw tat we're friends
Kara (5:34 p.m.): n aunts
Kara (5:35 p.m.): do u wanna go pick up some stuf 4 our future niece together

Lena (6:09 p.m.): I see you still can't text in proper English.

Kara (6:14 p.m.): no 1s gt time 4 tat

Lena (6:15 p.m.): Not our niece. Your niece. I'm just a fun aunt who's her mother's best friend.

Kara (6:16 p.m.): i bet u 50 bucks tat sam wil want u to b a godmother

Lena (6:16 p.m.): I'll take that bet

Being adopted into the Luthor household meant that everything was catered to her. There were maids and butlers – Lena was kind of surprised that they didn't have footmen. During her childhood, Lionel and Lillian were hands-off, never spoon feeding her, only there for the school activities and ensuring that she was the smartest they could get her to be.

In that sense, they were great parents. Lionel would bring her to LuthorCorp and let her study documents on the latest medical tech they were developing, either asking for input from her five-year-old brain or educating her on the different aspects on how LuthorCorp products were changing the medical field. Lillian would sit there, tutoring her on science and math, sometimes even English if Lena was really stumped, though she rarely ever was.

But other than that, they never brought her to a toy store. Sneered at the sight of arcades and fun fairs. The most fun they ever had together as a family was the golf course, teaching her grips and swings and calculations of distances to get the ball in the hole.

The Luthors bred and cultivated geniuses, but never really children.

Her brother, on the other hand, was different. He seemed to understand that Lena was…different, that she only had half a Luthor in her genes, so while she had the intellect, she also had the yearning for something other than numbers and organs.

He taught her how to ride horses. He showed her how to be kind to the staff and ask about their families. He displayed humanity that Lionel and Lillian seemed incapable of. He was the one who exhibited that feelings were not bad and it wasn't wrong to talk about them, either to a therapist or a close friend. Or a brother who tried his best to make sure she wouldn't grow up cold and heartless.

He was the only who had publicly showed his support for her relationship and subsequent marriage with Kara, and she loved him solely for that.

"How's National City, kid?"

She hummed. "I saw Kara."

He paused, perplexed expression obvious in the pixels of her phone screen. "I'm sorry. Which Kara?"

She rolled her eyes and settled comfortably on her couch. "We only know one Kara."

"I once had sex with a Kara."

"That is disgusting and I don't wanna know," she sneered, rolling her eyes again.

He cleared his throat. He was clearly still in the lab, what with the coat and the goggles tucked on top of his shiny bald head – she wanted to touch his scalp through the screen, just to provoke him a bit. "Right. Is she being mean to you? I have cronies in National City," he added with a teasing wink.

She scoffed and carded her fingers through her hair. "No, we're…friends now, I think," she muttered, squinting a little, recalling her conversation with the blonde last night. "And Alex, James, and Lucy. I saw them too."

"I'm starting to think National City has it out for you."

"I moved here knowing they'd be here."

"Come on, kid," he prompted, taking off the goggles and heading out a door of a room or something. She couldn't tell through the small screen. "Tell me everything."

And she did, because he was her brother – and after the divorce, he and Sam were the only ones she could truly talk to without being afraid of judgement on the other end.

She told him about the accident that led to their reunion. She told him about Alex scolding her for disappearing and not reestablishing contact. She told him about what it was like to see Kara again, all blonde and clumsy and still totally electrifying with her unfairly blue eyes and steady tortoise-shell spectacles. She told him about the lingering heartache that had never left and how her brain still came to a standstill whenever Kara even so much as hinted at a smile.

It felt nice to get it all off her shoulders, because she couldn't tell Sam everything, given that the woman was married to Alex and she deserved to not have to keep secrets from her own wife. Still, she also felt like she might pick up on day drinking just to lighten off the immense confusion that had come with seeing her ex-wife again and finding out that she was still the sweet and bumbling Kara Danvers that Lena had fallen in love with six years ago.

"Surprisingly, they don't hate me," she said, a small smile on her lips. "I can't imagine why."

"Come on. They're smart people. They were there when it all went down. They know you had to walk away," Lex deduced as he clicked his tongue, disapproving of her attitude. "So do we hate Kara or like Kara?"

See, this was why she loved him – he was always on her side. "Would it be weird if I say we liked Kara?"

He shrugged. "You did marry her."

"And divorced her."

He hummed. "Do you wanna…tell mom and dad about it?"

"Mom's gonna laugh at me."

"She'll also get the chef to cook you your favorite food," Lex pointed out, which wasn't completely untrue. Lillian may be cold, but she showed that she cared in different ways, subtle ways that took Lena more than ten years to figure out. "Look, kid, I just want you to live your best life as a doctor and a person. As long as you're happy and the people in your life are good people, I'm all for it."

"I missed her, you know," she admitted, something she never managed to tell Kara last night.

"You'll be okay, kid."

"Yeah. If not, just call me. Like I said, I have cronies in National City."

Chapter Text

"Do not laugh."

"No one's laughing."

"Danvers looks like her lungs are about to burst."

The lieutenant mimed zipping her mouth, but couldn't help snorting rather rudely even then. Like a domino effect, the rest of the team started chuckling or trying their best to muffle their mirth. Kara could only raise her hands in defense, deliberately not looking at the victim who was stuck in an embarrassing position.

"Look, it's not everyday you get called to rescue a lady who's stuck in a window because she aimed her poop wrongly," she offered and snorted again after stealing a glance at said lady. "See, this is why I don't do online dating."

"This is not the reason. You don't even date," Sam replied blithely, throwing a knowing glance at her sister-in-law and motioning the rest of the team to get to work. "Just for being a rude bitch, you're on poop duty."

At that, none of them even tried to hold back their amusement, guffawing and patting Kara's shoulders as they walked past. Meanwhile, Kara could only squawk and gape, until she relented to her fate and started scrounging for a paper bag. Well, at least she didn't have to look the woman in the face, or she would have actually laughed harder.

It took them about two hours to pry the window open, with Nia focusing on calming the woman down so that her internals wouldn't get too messed up after the mess she was already in. Surprisingly, but sweetly still, the woman's date didn't seem to mind that he had to call in city resources to rescue her from her diarrhea panic, and didn't even hesitate to ask her out on a second date.

Of course, Caitlin had to be snipy and remind them that they would probably have to have their second date in the hospital. But that only kind of made it sweeter, because the guy actually sat in the hospital with them, claiming that he was gonna raid all the vending machines in the hospital so they could have their second date immediately.

"I bet they're gonna get married and have two and a half kids," Kara mused as she sat in the passenger seat of the engine while Sam drove.

Sam hummed in ponderance. "So you still believe in it?"

Kara turned to her, narrowing her eyes slightly. "What do you mean?"

For a moment, all the captain did was flex her fingers on the steering wheel, biting her lower lip as she contemplated whatever it was in her head. Then she moved to shift her headset and cup the microphone. Oh, okay, so they were doing that kind of talk now. The blonde mirrored her captain's movements as well, waiting.

"Marriage, you still believe in that?" Sam asked carefully, deliberating taking advantage of her role as a driver to not look at Kara.

Kara blinked a few times, and then she sighed, casting a perfunctory glance at James, Nia, and Winn, who were sitting behind them, to make sure they weren't eavesdropping. "Just because my marriage failed doesn't mean every other marriage is gonna fail, Sam," she answered. "I will admit there was a time when I practically didn't believe in anything, but it was a phase."

That was a bleak phase, spanning from the denial to anger stages of her grief process in mourning the death of her marriage to the most radiant being on the face of the planet. She didn't believe in anything; everything either made her extremely sad or extremely angry.

But then she witnessed relationships around her, burgeoning and unrelenting in their utter devotion. The kind where one would die for the other. Alex and Sam. James and Lucy. Clark and Lois. Her disappointment in the idea of relationships were relit as she watched them, and her failed marriage was just one of many, like Alex and Sam's marriage were just one many successful marriages.

How could she not believe in a beautiful thing like love when she saw it every day in the way where Sam always kept her promise to be home on time? Or the way Alex had a standing reservation at their favorite restaurant for their wedding reservation? Or the way Clark looked at Lois like she created the universe?

Sam nodded in acceptance. "Would you…wanna do it again?" Kara raised an eyebrow. "Get married, I mean," Sam clarified.

Without even a hesitation, because this was question that she'd asked and answered herself many times in the past, Kara said, "No."

"Why?"

Kara had to look away, because she couldn't be confronted with the looks and sighs that would definitely come. Her grip on the mic tightened, because this was the one thing she couldn't let anyone else know. No one that didn't know her history with Lena anyway.

"I had my chance with the best person I could ever be with, and I blew it. I don't want another chance with anyone lesser."

That was always it. Lena was always it. Lena was her best chance, her best anything, and she blew it all to hell.

She didn't know what would happen in the future. Maybe sometime down the road, she would watch Lena walk down the aisle to someone else. Kara didn't know how she would feel then, but she would never stop hoping that it would be an individual who knew to love and appreciate Lena better than she did.

It was kind of fucked up that children things, things that would only be used for at most five years, clothing that only fit for less than a year before they to be switched out again; these tiny, little children things for tiny, little children could cost so damn much. Kara had never known until she walked into the mall, and she inadvertently developed a deeper appreciation for parents.

She'd been gasping and groaning at every price tag she looked at. And now, she was just glaring at a stroller that she'd passed by – not that she was planning on buying it, because Ruby was five and Alex told her that she didn't need a stroller at that age. Kara was just passing by, and she caught a glimpse of the price tag, and now she was just glaring at it, like there was a chance that the object would catch on fire and do away with it.

Lena sidled up to her and glanced at the array of strollers in front of them. "I think Ruby's a little too big for strollers," she remarked teasingly, as if she hadn't been listening to Kara complain about the exorbitant prices of these tiny and unsustainable things for little human beings.

Kara made a sound, almost inhumane, so loud that a passing mother had to cover her daughter's ears; no children should ever learn to make a sound so obscene. Not that she cared; she found herself unable to think about anything but at the strollers that could have taken a huge chunk out of any middle-class family's income.

"That thing's 400 bucks," she growled, pointing at one stroller. "I saw one that was like…800 bucks just now."

"Yes, children are expensive to maintain. You should have a look at the price rates of our pediatric wing," Lena muttered, quietly steering Kara away from the offending items by pulling on her elbow. "We're not here for strollers though."

"It's not even just the strollers."

"I haven't seen you this passionate for quite some time."

"Look at the prices of these things!" Kara exclaimed, stopping by the clothing section and pointing a random tiny sweat shirt. "$80 for something that they can't even fit in two years! Ridiculous."

"Amen to that, sister," a random woman remarked as she walked past them, as haggard looking as a mother should look.

"Hey, this is actually cute," Lena commented on the sweat shirt that Kara had been looking at. "Ruby would look great in this." When she looked up and saw Kara balking at her, she rolled her eyes and sighed. "Only the best for your niece, Danvers."

The blonde deflated at that, seeing the truth in Lena's words. They were in this shop for a reason. She sighed and remembered the pictures that Alex had been sending her since she and Sam had announced the adoption plan, and subsequently melted at the sight of Ruby, all five years old and ready to have a horde of non-blood family crooning at her like the most precious thing on earth.

"I'm just saying it's ridiculous," she grumbled while flagging down a nearby sales assistant to find out what size would best fit a five-year-old girl.

By then, a sales assistant had sidled up to them.

Kara was still unnerved by the glaring price tags all over the place, but she was also warmed up all over. Watching Lena patiently going over the list that she'd inevitably compiled the night before; nothing but the best for the new kid that would show up in their lives, albeit not theirs. Looking at the way Lena smiled and giggled at things that she found cute. Bickering over price tags and yet paying for them at the cashier anyway.

This was a reminder, a bittersweet one. Of all the good old times, when they were two young fools in love who would take joy in something as simple as a late-night Costco run because they'd run out of Ben & Jerry's. The easy laughter and giggles. The sneaky and not-so-sneaky kisses. The sex in the fitting rooms and getting kicked out of a bar because they'd gotten too frisky on the dance floor.

It would be a lie to say that she didn't still miss it. Just being in Lena's arms in bed late at night, talking about everything and nothing – that was the best; something Kara could never find with anyone else no matter how much hard she tried.

"Hey, do five-year-olds still drink formula?"

"How are you a paramedic?"

Lena and Kara walked into the shop empty-handed and came out with no less than six huge paper bags, filled with clothes and cups and snacks and safety gates, but mostly clothes. The sales assistant had been positively delighted at the amount they were purchasing, or maybe just the commission she would be getting just for the cutting the deal.

Standing outside the shop, mall patrons milling about them to do their own businesses, the blonde and the raven-haired woman hesitated. Shopping for her niece was some sort of a reprieve, and yeah, they may be friends now, but the air still hung heavy with their past and it would be impossible for them to ignore that. For Kara to ignore that.

She could see that Lena was about to walk away, and she didn't know what possessed her at the moment, because it would be better for Lena to walk away and have another try at this weird friendship thing they agreed to some other time. But she certainly didn't let Lena do that.

"Do you wanna take a walk?" she invited.

The mall was close to both the hospital and the firehouse, which meant they were also close to the park where Lena had once yelled at Kara for things in the past. In retrospect, Kara still couldn't figure out whether it was a good decision to come to a place so close after all.

Lena blinked and smiled a little. "We're carrying six bags of stuff, Kara," she said, heaving the bags up. "I don't know about you, but I do not have the biceps that you've been blessed with."

"Been looking, huh?"

"Hard to miss."

"We can put these in your car first," Kara replied quickly, as she didn't know how she can respond to Lena's easy retort. "Unless…you don't wanna take that walk with me. No pressure. I just thought…" she drifted off and refrained from sighing at her own uselessness.

Lena worried her lower lip, eyes still locked on Kara. For a moment, Kara was thrown back to the time when they'd run into each other again on the quad after the first time they'd met, and Kara had bravely asked Lena out for coffee, setting in motion a whole array of laughter and tears and heartbreak.

And then Lena nodded. Kara could hardly fight off the smile from showing up on her face, only following Lena to her car to drop off their expensive purchases.

Dog were pattering all over the park, chasing after boomerangs and sticks. Couples were strolling, old and young, loving and arguing, holding hands and distanced. Toddlers were toddling around, yelled after by their parents and giggling about like they didn't have a care in the world; well, maybe because they really didn't.

All sorts. And among them were a firefighter and a doctor. Front-liners. Noblest jobs in the world. Saving cats and saving lives. Strangers wouldn't know a lick about them by just looking at them. Strangers saw only a thoughtful look on the raven-haired woman's face and a pensive expression clouding the blonde. Strangers wouldn't have thought that their history ran years back; that there were divorce papers tucked in the back of their storage unit, willfully banished and unwanted.

Dogs and couples and toddlers and parents saw Lena and Kara, but not really Lena and Kara.

They didn't know that Kara was struggling with feelings that had never been washed away despite three years of having separated from the woman next to her. They didn't know that Lena was feeling immense guilt for having yelled and given up so easily, landing her and Kara in the awkward position they were currently in.

"Would we have gotten a dog?" Kara eventually asked after spotting a golden retriever delightfully sneezing in its owner's face.

Lena saw the golden retriever too and giggled slightly. "Honestly, you almost convinced me of it before it all fell apart," she confessed.

Kara felt a familiar ache tugging in her chest at the reminder. She offered, "Barnaby."

"Horrid name."

"Barney, in short."

"Yes, most likely."

"Maybe not a golden retriever."

"I quite like a schnauzer."

"Oh, they're cute."

"Grumpily so."

"Fifteen years?"

"I reckon longer than that."

"Would hypothetical Barney the schnauzer save our marriage?" Kara then asked.

Even then, she couldn't quite bring herself to regret her line of questioning. It was as if one tipsy conversation on Alex's fire escape had knocked down the dam and unleash the questions that had been haunting her brain for three years. When Lena paused in her steps, Kara did too, staring at her ex-wife expectantly.

Lena inhaled deeply and held it for a long moment before expelling it all in one whoosh. Then she lifted her eyes to meet Kara's soulful ones. "No, Kara, I don't think so."

The knife went deeper – the knife that had never gone away, just like her bubbling feelings. She should have known from the moment at the bus stop that she would forever be leashed to this woman in front of her, ethereal and bright and oh so compelling in her very presence. The Luthors certainly did a good job in crafting Lena; Kara briefly wondered if she'd ever thanked her former in-laws for that.

Part of her wanted to argue Lena's seemingly decisive conclusion, but her ears picked up on the fragility in Lena's tone and the unwillingness she'd overtaken to speak the words, so she didn't. She'd spent the latter part of their marriage arguing with the woman; arguing now wouldn't make much sense. It wouldn't do either of them any good.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you," Lena said as they restarted the walk. "I was exhausted and you were there and I – well, it was surprising, to say the least," she added with a sardonic chuckle. "It was unfair of me."

"I'm sorry I ever made you feel like I never enjoyed these walks with you," Kara offered her own apology, softly and wholeheartedly. The evident surprise in Lena's eyes only served to hurt more. "I had never not look forward to spend time with you, but I guess I hadn't really learnt how to juggle my responsibilities, letting everything mix with everything, and that eventually affected the way you perceived me."

Lena tilted her head. "You said you stopped convincing me that you loved me. What did you mean?"

"You were – I was away from home a lot. Didn't even have time to convince you to get a dog with me," she added with a laugh. "And you thought I just didn't wanna go home to you. Or that you were suffocating me. Or worse still, you thought I was cheating on you." She shook her head at the memories of Lena hurling those accusations at her. "I kept telling you that none of those were true, because, Lena, the best moment of my day had always been coming home to you."

"But I wouldn't listen."

"Yeah, so eventually, a part of me decided to just fuck it and let you believe whatever you think of me. Well, whatever, except for the part where you thought I would cheat on you," she said firmly, clenching her fists in her pockets. "There is no way in the world I would have cheated on you, Lena. I wanted to be better for you, which was why I even decided to take a chance at being a paramedic in the first place."

"You didn't have to do that."

"Your mother didn't like me for being a flimsy firefighter when you were pretty much a neurology and a trauma surgeon already."

Lena only laughed at that, which Kara found slightly offensive. "Kara, my mother gave me a dressing down for 'divorcing a splendid wife' such as yourself. Her words, not mine."

Kara blinked and then squawked so loudly in disbelief that a few ducks scurried away from them. "No way!"

"Darling, I've told you many times that Lillian Luthor is an acquired taste."

Behind her ribs, the blonde's heart lurched at the pet name. A sudden stone rose up in her throat. She gulped it down and whispered, "I missed that, you know." Lena raised a brow, unaware still of what Kara was referring to. "You calling me that. I missed it." The brow lowered back to its original position. "I miss a lot of things."

Lena looked away abruptly and swallowed. "Kara," she enunciated carefully, shaking her head. "You can't say things like that. Not anymore."

"I know."

"I can't even remember the last time we kissed."

"Sam's birthday," Kara answered immediately. "You were standing out on the balcony at their old place, because you needed some air. I joined you. You were drinking…orange juice. I told you I drive us back home, but you didn't trust me driving, so you started diluting all the alcohol with orange juice after your second glass of wine. And we kissed. It was a full moon. That was the last time we kissed."

This time, Lena was the one staring at her. Well, more like gaping. Meanwhile, Kara was the one who didn't dare look at her, choosing to concentrate on her sneakers instead.

The courage that came with that tipsy fire escape conversation only went so far. Despite their current friendship that was still in an odd place, there were still some things she would like to keep to herself.

Like how she could remember their first kiss, first date, first time saying the four-letter word, first fight, first everything. Like how she kept thinking about their last kiss, last laugh, last walk, last kiss, last everything, to nitpick the moment either of them decided they'd had enough. Kara could never confess to the fact that she had never stopped thinking about these things. About Lena.

"Do you and Lena Luthor have a secret kid or something?" Winn asked after they'd spent thirty minutes in the gym, where he'd looked as if he was constipated for almost as long as they'd been in there.

Water literally spurted out of Kara's nose. The bottle she was holding had dropped dramatically on the floor, spilling its contents all over the place. She swallowed the remaining water and started coughing hysterically, gaping at him the whole time.

Unfortunately for them – or maybe just her – Nia, Barry, and James were passing by the room. They skidded to a halt immediately, two of them gaping between Kara and Winn while one was just decidedly alarmed and wary at Winn's unwarranted query.

"What?" Kara gasped, having taken a seat on the yoga ball and still patting her chest.

"I saw you. At the mall. With the doctor," Winn stuttered, looking like he immensely regretted the way he'd blurted the question.

"Winn, you don't just ask a question like that!" James admonished, pushing past Nia and Barry to smack Winn on the arm. Not really lightly, considering the arms he'd built. He turned to Kara still, slightly bemused despite it all. "What were you doing at the mall with Lena anyway?"

"Lena?" Nia muttered.

"Ask Sam," Kara offered James, electing to ignore Nia's observation. James' brows rose, comprehending the secrecy of the situation. She turned towards Winn, wry smile on her lips. "No, Winn, I do not have a secret kid with Lena."

"Still with the Lena," Barry observed, tilting his head as he squinted at them. "Are we missing something?"

Kara shook her head as she chuckled lightly, pulling on James' arm to tug him out of the gym with her. "None of your business," she threw over her shoulder.

It was only until they'd rounded the corner, on the way to the locker room, that James burst into raucous guffaws. Just heaving, almost wheezing with it. So much so that he had to lean against the wall and keel over, propping his hands on his knees to keep himself standing.

The blonde rolled her eyes but couldn't help grinning herself. She joined him at the wall and shooed away anyone who even showed a sign of curiosity at the two of them. She wouldn't lie and say that Winn's outburst hadn't been hilarious, but it also served as a sore reminder that she and Lena had never really gotten to that point in their marriage.

"We were buying things for Ruby," she explained once he'd sobered up. "I spent most of it gawking at the prices of kids' stuff," she added, still finding it hard to believe.

"So you guys are…okay now?"

Kara shrugged. She and Lena had parted ways with smiles on their faces and words of seeing one another again – given their jobs, they would be seeing a lot of each other. But she'd gone home and thought about their conversation, and it invoked emotions all over again, spilling out the corners of her eyes and into a tub of Ben & Jerry's.

"Okay is an overstatement. We're working on it."

"Well, you're shopping together. I'd say that's something."

"She didn't remember the last time we kissed."

James stiffened a little next to her. He watched her for a bit, studying her expression and attempting to find words that wouldn't stick that knife deeper. "I think a lot of the memories in the latter part of your marriage overshadowed a lot of the other stuff for her, but I'm sure it doesn't mean she loved you any less," he said carefully, picking his words from a limited vocabulary suitable for a divorced friend.

She hummed, arms crossed.

"Secret kid, though," James echoed, grinning again.

She chuckled and shook her head. "We didn't even manage to get a dog, goodness."

Just then, Sam hurried around the corner, almost colliding into a coat rack as she came to a sudden stop in front of them. Her face was stricken with fear and concern, and she looked at Kara, her phone tightly gripped in her hand.

"It's Lena."

Kara pushed off the wall in an instance. "What? What about Lena?"

"Her father's had a heart attack."

Chapter Text

Looming and tall, gigantic and cold, the Luthor manor stood by itself amidst sprawling greens. History, childhood, empires, held within the walls of the building and unrelenting in their continued grasp of majesty. The manor had stood a century; it may stand a century more.

Long empty, save for master and mistress and a cartel of maids and butlers and footmen, the manor was unusually lively. Well, perhaps lively wasn't the right word, not when they were all fearing for the survival of a man who paid well and was humane in his treatment of his employees. But there were more activities than usual, to serve the return of the prodigies.

One of the prodigies sat, hidden in an alcove at the east wing of the manor, earbuds tucked in her ears and avoiding the subtle prods of her mother or the ever-present urge to serve of the staff. She hid in the alcove and she played her music at the loudest. And ironically, The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face started playing.

And much like the many times that she'd listened to this song, Lena couldn't help but think about Kara.

"It's weird."

"What is?"

"It's raining, and I want to stay under this umbrella with you," Kara had iterated that fateful rainy day after Lena had escorted the blonde to her dormitory, a bashful smile on her face but her eyes filled with unbridled courage.

When Lena had seen this tall blonde curled up unnaturally at a bus stop, she hadn't given much thought to it. She just felt bad for the girl and given that she had an umbrella, she may as well be a good Samaritan.

Even when she had a good look at the Kara's face, she didn't really think about mindlessly attractive the girl was, because McKinley building was a distance away from her own place. But she was already here; it wouldn't be nice for her to just walk away, though there was a paper she had to revise before submitting it to her economics professor the following afternoon.

And then they walked without speaking a word. Just Kara holding her umbrella and the two of them huddling under it to avoid getting splashed as much as possible.

Then they reached McKinley building, and Lena was ready to bid farewell. Except Kara stopped her in her tracks with her startlingly brave words. That was when Lena truly saw Kara as she was – blonde and long and with blue eyes that could stare a person into a melted state.

"Do you have coffee upstairs?" Lena had found herself asking.

Lena was just thinking about Kara's face under the umbrella, shaded but unwittingly bright as her grin widened, when her phone buzzed, interrupting Roberta Flack crooning. She started in the alcove, almost falling off, and glared at her phone, only to inhale sharply.

"Kara?" she greeted after picking it up.

"Hey," the firefighter breathed, and god, Lena hadn't realized how tense she had become until she heard Kara's voice, flowing into her muscles. "I – um, I heard about your father."

Lena nodded, feeling her own heart clench at the reminder. "Yeah, I figured."

"So, funny story. Or maybe not so funny, now that I think of it. It's not funny at all. I'm sorry. Just –"

"Kara, what is it?"

"I'm outside."

Lena stood upright, having an inkling of what Kara was saying, but she didn't dare look out the window that overlooked the front lawn. "Outside where?" she asked hesitantly.

Kara clicked her tongue. "Lena, I'm looking at you right now."

One would think that after reestablishing their friendship, it wouldn't be so awkward or weird to see them face to face. And back in National City, maybe it wouldn't have been.

But they weren't in National City. They were at the outskirts of Metropolis, standing on the premises of Lena's childhood, and inside were people who once knew Kara as Lena's wife. They had built a relationship in this manor; Kara had been interrogated by her family in this manor; and they had spent countless holidays in this manor.

It was difficult to look at Kara's face and not think about all the things that they'd done together, specifically here. She would look at the porch and recall the nights they spent cuddled on the steps to while away the chef's food. She would look at a gazebo a few yards away and think of how her brother almost caught her and Kara having sex right there.

"What are you doing here?" Lena asked, after having rushed from the alcove and down the stairs to the foyer, startling a few maids and footmen, and ran out the front door. Barefoot, no less. "How did you get here? Why are you even here?"

Kara scratched at her brows and cleared her throat. "I heard about your father," she offered.

Lena blinked. "Kara," she pronounced slowly, noticing the knowing looks that the gardener was sending them – the gardener who found Lena's panties in the bushes. "We're not – that's not – you and I are divorced."

Kara frowned deeply. "What's that got to do with anything?"

Combing her fingers through her hair, the raven-haired woman looked away from her ex-wife to glare at the gardener, who had the good sense to scurry away, but he would surely be telling the whole house about it. Eventually, her brother and mother would hear about it.

"You're not supposed to…" she drifted off, gulping uncertainly.

"Care about your father?" Kara finished for her.

"Care at all," Lena breathed, shaky and vibrating with unnamed emotions.

Kara's brows ceased in their merger, her face empty as she gazed at her ex-wife. For a moment, Lena thought she was angry or something, for whatever ridiculous reason, much like the ridiculousness of her showing up at the manor three years after their divorce.

And then, almost as surprising as her appearance, understanding began to surface all over the blonde's expression, soft and – dare Lena assume – considerate. Kara heaved a sigh, one that was a mixture of frustration and comprehension.

She lifted her gaze to look at the manor behind the doctor with the same kind of frustration and fondness. It took her a moment, perhaps allowing herself a couple of minutes to study the building that her ex-wife had grown up in. The house that she and Lena had spent countless hours in, fighting and maneuvering and loving one another through it all.

"But I do. I've always cared," Kara finally confessed, softly, looking at Lena again with a shrug. "Plus, your dad has – had – always been nice to me. I wanna return the favor." She sighed when she saw the unconvinced look on Lena's face. "Look, divorce or not, your family used to be my family. I can't just pretend that –"

"You did for three years," Lena interjected, immediately regretting it when the hurt flashed across Kara's blue eyes. She winced and took a step back from the blonde, thinking that it must be the closeness that must have clouded her judgement a little. "I'm sorry. That wasn't fair of me."

"No, it wasn't."

Lena crossed her arms and rubbed harshly at the bridge of her nose as she exhaled shakily and loudly. She gulped down the sudden ball of emotions that had welled up in her throat and shook her head to herself.

"Kara, I was so scared," she finally sobbed, falling into the fear that she had been keeping at bay since the moment her brother had called her, her face falling into her hands as she started heaving dry tears.

In the next moment, a pair of familiarly warm and strong arms wrapped around her torso, pulling her into another familiarly warm and strong body that had never failed to keep her at bay and root her to the ground. The hands were gentle and unflinching as they stroke over Lena's back in a comforting circular motion.

And unconventional as it was, to be so intimate with someone you had broken your vows with, Lena allowed herself to sink into this moment of respite. Of Kara whispering comforting words in her ears. Of the firefighter embracing her like it was just another day. Of herself momentarily forgetting that she hadn't felt this in three years.

"Lena, I know you're worried about your father, but you have to – oh."

"Hi, Lil – Mrs. Luthor."

Lillian Luthor blinked rapidly, completely taken aback by the sight of the woman standing next to her daughter.

Anyone who'd met the family more than once would have known for a fact that Lillian Luthor did not react like that. The matriarch was always calm and composed. The force behind her husband's success. The ever-steady hands that had never failed to guide the empire out of crises. The voice of reason among the unusually intelligent brood.

And yet, here she was, blinking and speechless, her phone long abandoned in her hands hanging in the air. It was nice to know that at least her stepmother was human in that way as well, in spite of her habitual lack of expression. Lena loved Lillian like she would love her own mother, but there were times when she wondered if Lillian felt.

Lena stood there, watching as her mother turned her blinking stare from Kara to her, still visibly shaken by the blonde's sudden appearance in her parlor. The parlor where she'd once caught Lena and Kara topless next to the China vase. Goodness, the things she and her ex-wife had gotten up to.

When even Lena herself failed to offer any kind of explanation – seriously, how could she explain this on top of everything else – Lillian finally deigned to get herself together. Mouth closed and back straight. Regal and intimidating as the first day Kara met her.

"To be honest, I have occasionally wondered where you've been these days," Lillian offered, not a hint of emotion – it was no wonder that Kara thought she'd hated her.

Kara cleared her throat and smiled politely. "Alive and well, ma'am," she replied. "I heard about Lion – Mr. Luthor," she corrected herself, reminding Lena once again of how unfamiliar they had all become with each other. "How are you?"

"You two still keep in touch?" Lillian sidestepped and asked, almost a little accusingly as she narrowed her eyes at her stepdaughter.

The blonde's eyes widened, and in lieu of answering, she turned to Lena, directing wide questioning eyes at the doctor. Lena licked her lips and shrugged, hissing, "I dare you to explain this whole thing to your own mother." At that, Kara deflated in defeat, allowing Lena a moment of petty victory. "Kara's a firefighter. In National City."

"I see." She may be seeing, but the look on Lillian's face definitely indicated a longer conversation later on. "It's nice of you to come by, Kara. I'm sure Lionel would be happy to see you." At that, Lillian swung around to head back out the door, obviously expecting Lena and Kara to follow.

As the two younger women followed, Lena couldn't help but be a little smug, in spite of the emotional turmoil that she'd just been through, and was admittedly still going through.

"I told you she likes you," she muttered.

Kara made a noise of skepticism. "I wouldn't be too sure about that."

Doctor she may be, Lena was still a neurosurgeon. Ask her any question about the brain, and she wouldn't fail to rattle off statistics and facts about it. But matters of the heart, well, after her divorce, she'd steered away from it, knowing that she was too pragmatic a person to have the capacity of specializing in it.

Hence, it was difficult to learn that her father had suffered a heart attack, but even harder to know that she wasn't in the position to be his main caretaker. Not that her family would have allowed it, being doctors themselves – they, of all people, understood that family should never treat family; it would just open up a whole host of disasters they weren't prepared for.

Once her brother had informed her, she'd instructed him to send over the charts. She understood what the words were saying and what the numbers were indicating. She understood it all. She even knew the procedures that would be taken to ensure that Lionel wouldn't expire.

She also knew that she wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

Even as a trauma surgeon, she would do what she could do and hand the patients off to the specialists once they were stabilized. She wasn't responsible for fixing the problems unless it was neurosurgery related. Plus, this was her father; she simply couldn't risk it.

"You have to give yourself a break."

"I'm a fucking doctor," Lena exclaimed, seated at the alcove.

Meanwhile, Kara was sitting on the alcove opposite her, as if she knew that Lena needed the space right now, unlike earlier in the garden. Lena refused to think about that moment of vulnerability, because Kara was her ex-wife, and she wasn't supposed to behave like that with her ex-wife. With anyone, for that matter.

"God, I should have chosen cardio."

"Hey, come on," Kara chastised, rolling her eyes. "You're good at what you do."

"Not good enough."

"Stop it." The firm and even mildly pissed off tone got Lena's attention, where she had to turn from the window to the blonde, whose jaw was clenched and eyes were fiery. "You sacrificed a lot to be where you are today." Inhaling a little, Kara shook her head and closed her head. "Even us."

Lena froze at the accusation. She frowned deeply, momentarily forgetting about her father who was still in a coma in the other wing. "What are you talking about?"

"I believe in you," Kara said assuredly, nodding at Lena. "I always have, and I always will. But we – it wasn't just my career getting in the way," she added, a little forlorn at the thought. "You wanted it all. And you wanted it fast. And you took it out on me."

Part of her would love to defend herself and deny the accusations. Lena was not the reigning debate champion in boarding school for kicks, after all.

But there was something about seeing Kara again after all these years of getting to calm down and look back at things in a different perspective, so she could actually fathom what Kara was going on about. Come to think of it, she wasn't all that surprised to find that their marriage had deteriorated the way it did.

"I don't drink as much anymore," she said lamely.

Kara smiled a little. "I'm glad." She licked her lips and swallowed. "Like I said, I'm proud of you still." Lena accepted the praise with a smile of her own. "You've done a great job for yourself."

"So have you."

"Would we have achieved so much if we had stayed married?"

"I think if we'd talked more than we yelled at each other, we could have done greater things," Lena confessed the thought that had been running through her mind since she and Kara started communicating again. "It sound cliché, but communication really is key."

Kara chuckled at that, leaning back in the alcove. "Your dad will be okay," she said, sobering up.

Lena hummed. She liked how Kara was so optimistic; it was one of the reasons she fell for the woman in the first place. But this time around, she simply didn't wanna risk optimism on her father. Bringing her hopes up simply wasn't an option right now.

It wasn't hard to see that Lionel was still pretty heavily medicated even as he'd woken up. As if he could sense Kara's presence in his house – the presence of the woman whom he'd treasured just for making his daughter happy.

In spite of the wooziness in his eyes, he could recognize Kara standing at his bedside, even managing to smile ever so slightly. His nod of acknowledgement was minuscule.

"My favorite daughter-in-law," he rasped after everyone else was done fussing over him, making sure he drank water and was actually talking to them, rather than a simple hallucination from their own mounting concerns. "I knew you two would figure it out," he continued, looking at Lena and Kara.

Lena froze, detecting something odder than usual in her father's words. She closed in on him and wrapped his hand in hers. "You got us worried there," she chastised softly.

He hummed and dismissed it by saying, "Just an old man doing old man things." She rolled her eyes, even though she was still relieved to find that her father's old-school humor remained intact. "I had a bad dream," he said, and when she hummed questioningly, he went on, "You and Kara broke up. And you were so sad. You wouldn't eat. All you could do was sleep. It was a bad dream." He smiled softly. "It's nice to know that wasn't real. My daughter being sad is the last thing I want."

"Mr. Luthor –" Kara stopped when all three other Luthors shot her a disapproving glare, shutting up.

Refusing to even let the concern show, Lena only tightened her grip on her precious father's hand, choosing to indulge him with a nod.

The professional in her instantly comprehended that her father wasn't in the clearest state of mind, perhaps an aftereffect of the medications that had yet to dissipate. The neurosurgeon in her wanted all the scans to make sure that his brain was intact and this was just temporary.

The daughter in her wasn't going to break her father's heart any further than she had to. She convinced herself that eventually, he would be okay. He would remember and things would go back to normal.

"I'm not sad, dad."

"Good. That's good."

"Go to sleep. You need more rest."

"I want grandkids," Lionel replied in lieu of obeying, smiling teasingly. "It's been long enough. Give me some baby feet to play with, the two of you."

Kara laughed from behind her, not of nervousness but of clemency. Great; she'd decided to play along with the charade. She went up next to Lena and wrapped an arm around the doctor's shoulders. Lena had to fight not to react to the touch, deliberately relaxing into the hands that hadn't properly touched her in three years and the warmth that she used to sleep next to in their happy days.

"We're gonna need you to be healthy enough to carry your grandkids, Lionel. So you do not have our permission to keep lying in that bed, okay?" Kara instructed playfully.

"Well, when you say it like that."

"Dad, go to sleep."

"Sometimes, I think she forgets I'm her father," Lionel whispered theatrically, though it was easy to tell that he was about to obey as his grip on Lena's hand slowly loosened.

Kara snorted and squeezed Lena's shoulder, as if that was normal. "It's what got us so wrapped around her finger," she commented.

Lena knew it was meant as a joke, or a manner in which to appease her sick father, but she couldn't help the way her heart skipped and her mouth twisted into a small smile. Kara and Lionel had always been the closest whenever they were together, able to make jokes at Lena's expense or just talk about the most random of things, while Lillian was trying and failing to connect with her former daughter-in-law.

And the one thing Kara and Lionel always joked about was how their lives pretty much centered on the woman that brought them together in the first place. Lena Luthor, the intelligent and unfailingly kind doctor who had eyes that would pull in even the coldest hearts, as proven by Lillian Luthor's devotion to her.

Eventually, Lionel drifted off to sleep, and they all slipped out of the room, except for Lillian, who stayed by her husband's side. Eventually, Kara's arm left her shoulders, and she was reminded of the state of things. Eventually, she remembered that it was all just a charade, and she and Kara could never go back to the way things were.

Behind the manor, there was a cliff. It reminded her a little of the Cliff of Moher, the one she'd once considered jumping off of before Lionel came over to pick her up and bring her over stateside. Beyond the cliff, the ocean roared and lapped, mysterious in its depths and scary in its mystery.

It was a reminder of the home that could be, so Lena liked to go out there sometimes in the middle of the night, especially when there was too much on her mind and she couldn't handle the intimidating portraits that dotted the walls of the manor. God, the number of times she'd been out there in the first few months since her divorce with Kara.

And there was almost always one person who'd keep her company, defying all the common perceptions of her in her gentleness.

"Mother."

"Daughter."

At some point, Lillian discovered Lena's habit of sitting out here, whether sunny or rainy, so she'd gone on to purchase two wicker chairs and a deck table, alongside a fire pit, and placed them a few yards away from the edge of the cliff.

Away from the judgmental eyes of her brother and her ex-wife, Lena pulled out a pack of cigarette packs from her back pocket and took out two sticks. Her mother gladly took the one handed to her, wiggling her fingers for a lighter. Lena placed it in her hand and waited for the woman to light her cigarette up before her turn.

"I shouldn't have taught you how to smoke," Lillian said, though with a smirk.

"This is the one single thing that made you the greatest mother on earth."

Lillian chuckled – that was the thing, she only reacted this way with her family, and Lena appreciated it so much. "I failed in many ways." Lena hummed questioningly. "I couldn't protect you from a lot of pain in your life," Lillian clarified softly.

"Mom," Lena pronounced gently, shaking her head. "I'm not even yours and you raised me like I am. You're a wonderful mother."

Lillian hummed in acknowledgement. "You came into the house with a teddy bear and I fell in love," she said, looking at Lena with a rarely seen adoration. "You didn't tell me about Kara." Lena sighed and leaned back in her chair, choosing to take in the cigarette. "Why not?"

"I needed to…process it myself."

"I was hard on you when you got the divorce, wasn't I?"

"She was a good daughter-in-law."

"Yes, but you're my daughter," Lillian refuted with disappointment clearly reflected in her eyes. "I was just – you were so happy with her, and I found it hard to imagine you that happy again."

That was undeniable. Lena was the happiest when she was with Kara, even until today. And Lillian could see it, despite her unfailing coldness and barely any word of approval when Lena had brought her home the first time.

The first time she'd brought Kara home, Lex was all jokes and Lionel was all pride and Lillian was all – well, she was all nothing. For a moment, Lena was scared that her mother wouldn't approve, because what then? But then later in the night, they had both hung out in the kitchen, and Lillian had given her the seal of approval when she asked what Kara would like for breakfast.

Lillian was an odd mother that way, but Lena couldn't exactly blame her. Everyone was raised the way they were, they adapted to the way they were raised, and Lillian was born in an aristocratic house with too many rules for her to develop proper emotions. The fact that she even managed to fall in love with Lionel and raise two kids was marvel in and of itself.

"She thought you hated her," Lena revealed with a grin.

Lillian raised her brows, smirking. "Really?" Lena nodded. "See, I told you I failed in some ways." Lena rolled her eyes. "I failed the most wherein I couldn't protect you from the heartbreak that adulthood could and can give you. I wish I could – when you and your brothers were kids, I wanted to just put you up in a shed and never let you go, just so you would never face the hardships of the world."

"I don't think that's legal."

"I'd kill someone for you and Lex, you foolish child," Lillian announced dismissively, flicking her cigarette. "Tell her I like her."

"I did."

"Tell her I like her purely because she made the effort to come here."

The younger doctor looked away from her mother in favor of the ocean, all wide and limitless and goodness, how she would love to delve into the ocean and not be afraid of the challenges ahead. She wanted to be like a whale, big and unapologetic, going wherever she'd like and plowing ahead for future adventures.

"She's so confusing," Lena muttered.

Lillian made a noise of indulgence. "The best people always are."

"Ridiculous."

"Are you happy?"

Lena was quiet again, looking at the ocean again, wishing life wasn't so hard again. "I don't think I can be that happy again."

The other woman sighed, dropping the cigarette and putting it out with the sole of her sandals. "I failed as a mother."

"Stop."

"Pass me another one." Lena obliged, tossing the pack over. "And come home more."

"The house is too big."

"I don't care."

Lena laughed and lifted the cigarette to her lips.

Behind them, the manor stood strong and firm in its foundation, willing to stand for a few centuries more. Inside, slept her funny brother, her ailing father, and her confusing ex-wife; all things that confused her despite her intelligence. For now, though, she would sit here by the cliff with her mother and smoke a few cigarettes, forgetting those things.

Chapter Text

The Luthor manor had been as intimidating as the first time Kara had seen it at 21 years old. Sprawling estates, horses in the stables, and an alarming amount of house staff who were alarmingly polite, though the last butler hadn't really hidden his disdain when he realized that Lena had brought home someone whom he would consider a trollop.

The butler that had greeted her yesterday was much nicer. Nice smile. Nice attitude. Didn't mind that she had driven a car that remarkably cost less than the others in the manor's garage.

Last time she'd been here, she slept in the west wing. In Lena's childhood bedroom. They did sinful things in that bedroom. Actually, they did sinful things in many corners of the manor, even got caught by Lillian, Lionel, or Lex for no less than ten times. Look, Lena was sinfully hot and Kara would never miss any opportunity to get in on that, sue her.

This time around, the butler had kindly led her to the east wing. The guest wing, with the generic four-poster beds and desks and no personality whatsoever. The room she was offered was comfortable, not that she was complaining, but she was just – she supposed she wasn't used to it. Huh, maybe she was complaining.

Which was why, being the not-morning person that she was, it surprised even herself that she woke up early in the morning, before the clock had even struck eight. She didn't try to go back to sleep, only getting up, brushing her teeth, and making her way around the maze of hallways that took her three visits to memorize.

She paused in her steps when she saw who was in the kitchen.

"Morning, Kara," Lex greeted, idly sipping coffee, as if the presence of his former sister-in-law in the house he grew up in wasn't a strange sight at all. "Coffee?"

She blinked a few times before nodding gingerly and entering the kitchen, pouring a cup of coffee for herself. "Morning," she greeted meekly. Never once had she ever felt so much like a stranger.

For the next couple of minutes, the two of them only sat at the island, drinking coffee and scrolling their phones. Kara actively ignored any texts that came from her sister or Sam. It was simply too early in the morning for that barrage of anger and confusion, even though she'd been ignoring their texts the moment she took the car.

"I wanted to send the mafia after you," Lex breached the silence with startling announcement, eyes locked on his phone.

Meanwhile, the blonde choked on her coffee. Thankfully, she didn't do something more embarrassing like coughing manically or spilling coffee in his coffee. She stared wide-eyed at the man, simultaneously startled and afraid.

For a brief moment, she wondered if she should jump in the car and just run. Lena would probably understand.

"Are you surprised that I wanted to send them after you or that I know them?" Lex asked lazily.

Kara blinked, tilting her head a little. "Both?"

"Well, we're the Luthors, we have connections," Lex started, finally looking up to lock onto her with...well, she couldn't actually read him. He didn't seem angry, but his words were intimidating. "And you broke my sister's heart."

Ah, so that was it. "To be fair, she broke my heart too."

He shook his head, as if he refused to accept the reply. That was the thing with the Luthors: stubborn as heck. It was one of the things she loved so much about Lena, even though she didn't like it at times.

"I don't care about fair. You broke her heart, and as you know, she's the treasure of the family." For some reason, Kara could accept that. If their roles were switched, she would probably wanna send mafia out to hunt down anyone who'd dare to hurt Lena. "What are you doing here, Kara?" Lex sighed, like he was tired. "What are you doing anywhere near her, for that matter?"

"What are you –"

"I'm sure you heard my father yesterday." She nodded in confirmation. "As…delusional as he was, he was not lying."

"Look, I'm sorry –"

"This family spent a lot of energy taking care of Lena after the divorce. And we don't want to ever see her in the state again."

"All due respect, Lex, would you mind letting me finish my sentences?" Kara retorted, growing irritable from his seemingly constant interruptions.

His brows went higher at her retort, but he only smirked and motioned for her to continue, as if he was impressed.

"Things happened. I don't know what Lena told you, but she wasn't the only one who was hurt in that whole affair. There were two bullets and they hit both of us," the blonde explained, fingers tapping less rhythmically on the island top as she talked. "But I loved her and I – she will always have a place in my life. Your father had a heart attack and I came, because I care about Lena and your father was – he was nice to me. He was probably the nicest person to me among all of you."

He winced jokingly. "That's harsh, but it still doesn't explain what you're doing near her."

Kara couldn't think of anything else to say but, "She's Lena." It came out as a sigh of frustration. As a sign of having given up on fighting things that didn't make sense. A pointer to a truth that she should have never let go even after the divorce.

He hummed and eyed for a long while, brows raised the whole way. Then he finished his coffee and went to wash the cup in the sink, because Lillian didn't raise slackers despite how loaded the family was. It was one of the things she admired about her ex-mother-in-law, no matter how intimidated she was by the older woman.

"I know I've always liked you for a reason," he said, making his way out of the kitchen and pointing a finger at her. "But don't hurt her again. Or I'll actually send goons after you."

Duly noted. She nodded at his threat and watched as he exited the kitchen.

"Isn't this Sam's car?"

"Yes."

"Did you…steal her car?"

"That's a strong word."

Lena snatched her hand from the door handle and pushed her hands into her jacket pockets, narrowing her eyes at her ex-wife, who was resolutely not looking at her. Then again, just the narrowing of the eyes was sufficient to drive even the strongest of men to his knees, Kara would know, which was why she was determined not to look into those green eyes.

"Kara," Lena pronounced warningly, slow and low.

Just then, before Kara could reply, her phone buzzed in her back pocket, like it did in array over the night, probably carrying the same message since Kara had jumped in the car and driven off without so much as a warning to anyone.

Wincing, the blonde plucked the device out of the pocket and read the text. Sent by Sam. Of course. It was her 23rd message in as many hours. The woman needed to chill, honestly.

Sam (10:26 a.m.): If you scratch my car.

Kara didn't even bother to type out a reply before putting the phone back in her pocket.

"I was worried about you," she said. It was the only thing she could say.

Kara had not hesitated.

Sam told her the news, and Kara jumped in the car, disregarding the fact that it was Sam's car she had absconded with because she didn't drive, and she just drove. She drove the hours and hours, the winding and twisting roads, the unavoidable honks due to her bad driving, until she reached the manor that had never failed to intimidate her since her first visit.

For some inexplicable reason, the face recognition system at the front gate could still recognize her, but she didn't give it much thought. She didn't give anything much thought, except for Lena. Not her lack of pre-empting her colleagues or sister about her sudden departure. Not the dirty dishes in the sink.

Nothing but Lena.

"Very worried," she added, placing her hands on the top of the car she'd borrowed…without permission. "Her keys were right there," she defended weakly, adding on a pout, because according to everyone in her life, it always worked.

Lena raised her brow, proving that it wasn't working on her ex-wife. Made sense, given that they were together for a little less than five years before their break-up.

"Give me the keys," the doctor instructed, thrusting her hand over the top of the car as well.

"Oh, come on."

"The last time you did this, you scratched Alex's car."

"That possum came out of nowhere!"

Lena was not shaken, only wiggling her fingers insistently. Kara rolled her eyes and obeyed, handing over the keys begrudgingly and grumbling under her breath. They switched sides and got into the car with Kara in the passenger seat and Lena in the driver's seat.

It had been a year before she and Lena got married – they were still in their senior year of university, but it was Christmas, so Lena had gone back to the manor while Kara had returned to Midvale. And then one night, the raven-haired woman had called her, sobbing, and Kara didn't even hesitate to race over to her.

Midvale was considerably further from Metropolis than National City was, so Kara somehow managed to scratch Alex's bumper. Then again, considering her driving skills, it probably shouldn't be as surprising as it used to be back then.

The car had basically been running on fumes when she reached the Luthor manor. That was also perhaps the first time in the first two years of her relationship with Lena that Lionel had shown signs of welcoming her to the family, smiling at her and actually asking about her life. Lionel was the second person in the family to welcome her.

"That possum –"

"Until today, I still can't tell if you made up the possum story as a weak defense," Lena retorted, pulling out of the garage to make it to the driveway.

"Why would I make something like that up?" Kara whined. Seriously, she should have taken a picture of that possum and keep it so everyone would shut up about it already.

The gates swung open and Lena kept driving. The firefighter only sat in the passenger seat, keeping an eye on her ex-wife while also taking in the scenery surrounding them.

Empty roads bracketed by tall cypress trees, something out of a movie. All of these, belonging to one family. At no point in time had Kara never felt threatened by the absolute magnanimity of the Luthors, the power they exuded by just existing. At a snap of their fingers, Lionel could take over a small country, Lillian could poison a river, Lex could change the face of medicine for the worse, or Lena could choose to no longer help people.

She supposed the medical field in the US – or anywhere in the world, for that matter – should be grateful that they chose to help. And as far as she was concerned, Lena would rather die than hurt another soul.

Then Lena took a right, entering a branching road into the forest that would have been missed by the naked eye if they didn't pay attention. And suddenly, Sam's car was slowing down along a dirt path, the green grew more intense, and the sun no longer blinded their eyes as the blanket of leaves protected them.

Lena pulled the car to a stop when they reached a clearing, with nothing but a tree stump in the middle and a few logs surrounding it to allow for intruders to sit. This was the way nature worked – you didn't disturb it, and it wouldn't disturb it. Strangely enough, Lex had taught her that the first time they came here, which eventually became Lena and Kara's spot whenever they visited the family.

"Everything's still the same," Kara commented, a reminiscent smile tugging at her lips as her boots stepped on dry leaves and her ears filled with the sounds of birds.

"Is it?" Lena asked, shoving her hands in her coat pockets as she trailed after Kara. "I haven't been here since…" she drifted off, pursing her lips, totally aware of Kara watching her. "Since our divorce."

"Why not?"

Lena shrugged and only shoved her hands deeper into her pockets, if that was even possible. "I heard you and Lex just now." Kara froze, blinking rapidly at her ex-wife. "All I did was sleep and drink soup for, like, a week. Maybe there were two bottles of bourbon. Or ten. I lost count."

Inevitably, because somewhere deep inside her, Kara had never stopped caring about the raven-haired woman, so when she heard those words, her heart ached immensely. Almost as much as when Lena had asked for a divorce three years ago.

She inhaled shakily and maintained a distance away from Lena. Yesterday was something out of the ordinary, where she allowed herself the luxury of taking Lena in her arms and letting herself be the dam for Lena's wall of tears. Today, she was determined to keep herself in control, to just be here for the woman who had inexplicably slithered back to the surface of deeply buried secrets.

She didn't know how it happened, but in the short time since she saw Lena again, the woman had begun to haunt all corners of her mind, bright or dark, like an unrelenting ghost. Kara couldn't tell if she hated that ghost, but she could never resist that ghost.

Lena…called to her. Like a siren. Like an unlocked bank with vaults full of gold. Like a long-lost lover.

"I worked myself to the bone," Kara offered, shrugging. "I studied and I worked and – well, I passed out one week in."

Green eyes cast her a look, sorrowful and even a little bemused. Well, Kara wouldn't blame her, because there was just something about the way they abandoned themselves after the divorce, even though they had both been certain that it would only be good for them.

"We're a mess."

Lena agreed with a nod. "Yeah, we are."

"Your dad –"

"It's the medication." When Kara raised her brows, Lena rolled her eyes and settled herself on a log around the tree stump. "He wants me to be happy, and he seems convinced that you're the only person who can make me happy."

"And that's not true."

"I don't need a partner to be happy, Kara. I have Sam. Even Andrea occasionally. I'm plenty happy."

Kara lowered her chin and scoffed. "Right. Andrea"

"Oh, come on."

Heaving a humorless laugh, Kara shook her head and sat next to Lena on the log. "No, no, I'm sorry. It's – Andrea Rojas," she said with a smirk. "I can't help myself."

In words as kind as she could manage, Kara could only say that Andrea Rojas was a pain in her ass since the moment they met – and she wasn't usually one to use foul words. That was, in no way, Andrea's fault. Well, maybe in some ways, it was, because the woman was the smuggest human being Kara had ever met, and she always thought a little humility could go a long way.

Beautiful. Intelligent. Hot. If Lena wasn't around, Kara probably would have tried to hit that. Alas, Lena was there; Kara thought there was no way in any life she led would she ever not find Lena. And if there was Lena, there was no one else.

But Lena was there. And Andrea was there. And no matter how much she trusted ex-wife, Kara simply couldn't help the jealousy that would throw all her common senses out the window. As much as she had neglected Lena in the later stages of their relationship, Kara had never been uglier than when she was jealous with Andrea.

The green-eyed monster did not let her go. In fact, it gripped at her and took over her senses like the monster it was, and it became the subject of most of her arguments with Lena, as little as there were.

"Nothing happened before or while we were together," Lena carefully stated, and stood up to make her way over to a random cypress tree, as if trying to get away from the blonde.

Kara tilted her head and stood up as well, following the doctor to the tree. "So something happened after?" she asked, wanting to slap herself for even wanting to know.

"My brother once told me that the best way to get over someone is to get under someone."

"You brother has never had any good advice."

"Yes, I realized that the morning after."

"There was a morning after?"

"I don't do one-night stands, Kara."

Kara stopped where she was, finally recognizing the situation they were in. Due to her persistence and Lena's apparent desperation but failure to get away from her, they were here. Lena against the tree, and Kara…so close to her. Only a few breaths way.

The last time they were this close, on the brink of something that would either make or break them, was three years ago. Biggest fight they ever had; Kara couldn't even remember what it was about anymore, but they were yelling at the loudest they could manage. Lena had thrown a vase; Kara had wanted to flip the apartment upside down.

Eventually, the anger got the better of the two of them, so much so that Kara had surged forward and Lena had readily accepted her approach. The last time they had sex, she couldn't tell where one began and the other one ended. The last time they had sex, and the next day, Lena had told her she wanted a divorce, naked in bed.

The last time they were this close, it broke them.

Kara wasn't angry now – she had no right to be. She also had no right to be jealous, but here she was. Jealous as hell. Wanting to uproot a tree just from the undesirable imagery of Lena and Andrea Rojas in bed together. Naked. Writhing against one another like kingdom come.

"There were more than once?" she asked, softly, heard only between them, ignorant to the nature around them.

Lena sighed, and Kara fought from keeping her eyes close from the waft of mint and coffee that traveled to her nostrils. "I had to get over you." She lifted a hand and traced a finger over Kara's right cheek, eventually cupping her face. "I'm always trying to get over you."

Something – impulse control, whatever – snapped in Kara. She surged forward, like she did three years ago, and captured Lena's lips with hers. Her hands pushed against the trunk Lena was leaning against, essentially trapping the woman there.

Homecoming, that was what it felt like. Oxygen. Resurrection. It felt like Kara hadn't been breathing for the last three years, and despite the fact that they were pressed together, exchanging air, Kara had never felt more alive in the years they'd been apart.

Mint and coffee and something uniquely Lena. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed her ex-wife. The woman whom Kara had once sworn to be there for, until death did them apart.

And when Lena willingly wrapped her arms around Kara's neck, there was simply no other way but to keep kissing her, because this was a lifeline. A lifeboat in the middle of a shipwreck that was Kara's torn heart since she signed her name on the dotted line. In this kiss was an ever-bright flame that had only ever dimmed, never extinguished.

"Fuck," Lena murmured, letting out a frustrated noise when Kara's fingers brushed the side of her breast.

"I will if you'll let me."

Lena's breath hitched, and in that moment, she pulled back. And Kara was afraid. Of what? She wasn't certain. Maybe she was afraid that Lena would say no. Maybe she was more afraid that Lena would say yes. Because what would this mean then? What would it all mean?

How did she let Lena haunt her so?

She looked into the raven-haired woman's eyes, and for a moment, she couldn't read Lena at all. She was most of afraid of that, amongst all the possibilities that could occur in the next second. She didn't like not knowing Lena.

"Isn't this the tree where we –"

"Had our first public sex? Yeah," Kara confirmed, reassuring herself as her fingers padded over the engraving located near Lena's lower back. "That was fun."

Lena huffed a laugh, but the blonde could still tell that she was fighting herself. When her teeth pressed over her bottom lip, Kara clenched her hands into fists, restraining herself from invading Lena's space any further than she had.

"Make it fun, Kara."

All the fear went out the window with the explicit permission. She grinned and leaned forward to capture Lena's lips again, but she didn't stay there. Her lips and hands wandered, like her mind had wandered since the moment she saw Lena at the roadside, saving a man's life.

Let the birds see. Let the trees be witness. She was going to have Lena.

Getting rid of all the sensations seemed an impossible task. Even after adjusting their clothes and driving back to the manor in silence, Kara could not extinguish the burn of Lena's skin on her skin. Or the sound of her moans and pants in her ears. Or the furnace of their coupling when she finally pushed inside Lena.

Perhaps nothing short of setting her entire body on fire could do that. And Kara would not. Despite her sensibilities, Kara didn't want to wash it all away, even though there was regret in Lena's eyes and avoidance in her body language. Really, Kara probably should have seen that coming the moment their lips captured one another, but she didn't allow herself to dwell on it until they were both finished.

Once they'd returned to the manor, she didn't say or do anything but start packing up her stuff. She couldn't very well just keep on staying here – there was a job and an angry sister-in-law waiting for her, after all.

When all that was done and one of the valets had taken her bag to be deposited in the car, she made her way to the west wing and entered the master bedroom, finding Lionel in his bed alone, but awake nonetheless. Looking into his eyes, it seemed that he was actually awake, rather than the wooziness he'd been in yesterday.

"I thought I dreamed you up," he greeted, kind smile on his face.

She hummed and smiled back at him, taking a seat in the spare chair at his bedside. "You look better, Mr. Luthor." He raised his brows, an admonishing expression on his face. "Lionel," she stammered. He nodded in approval. "I wanted to…see you one more time before I go."

"That fast?"

"Sam's pretty angry at me for stealing her car."

"Ah, yes, Samantha. A good one, that one." She nodded in agreement, not knowing what else to say. "Thank you for coming, Kara." She lifted her eyes from her hands, searching his face and finding no hint of malice or hatred. Curious. "I know I was rather out of it yesterday, but I meant what I said."

"Which part?"

"You being my favorite daughter-in-law."

"I was your only daughter-in-law."

He hummed and relaxed into the mountain of pillows behind him. "I'd wager you'd still be my favorite even if Lex pulls his head out of his ass and finds a worthy girl," he replied easily.

She tilted her head, frowning. "Shouldn't you…hate me?" she asked staggeringly, failing to comprehend how this man – heck, this entire family – could still be so accommodating to her status as an interloper.

"You made her happy." He scoffed weakly and continued, "Heartbreaks are passages of life. Little dots. Lord knows how many times my wife has broken mine and I've broken hers. And yet, we're still here." He reached out and she readily slipped her hand into his wrinkled one. "You survived. She survived. It's all that matters."

Lena Luthor lingered all over her – her scent and her touches and her sounds. Kara was looking at the man who raised her and there were words that she shouldn't say, but still hanging at the edge of her tongue, fighting to come out. To defy her sensibilities and be out in the open.

She swallowed and clenched her jaw, forcing the words back in. Lionel shouldn't be the first person to hear this.

But then again, if not Lionel, then who? As far as she knew, Lionel had always tried his best to be on the sidelines. A spectator. He never interfered unless his children or wife asked for it. He was a bystander, and the perfect person for her to reveal this new realization the moment Lena told her to 'make it fun'.

She opened her mouth, then closed it again. In fact, she stammered for quite some time. Even the usually patient Lionel seemed prepared to smack it out of her.

"What if I told you I'm still in love with her?" she blurted out, eyes wide as soon as the last syllable escaped her lips.

Even he seemed a little surprised by her confession. He tightened his grip on her hand, blinking as he processed her not-question question. Because it wasn't so much as a question as it was a need to get it out in the open. To let at least one person know. And obviously, Lena wasn't going to be that person anytime soon.

"I want her back," she added.

No point lying about it any longer. At least, not to herself.

For the past three years, since she packed up her things and left Metropolis to National City, she'd convinced herself that Lena wasn't largely part of the reason she left. She even believed in that line of convincing.

But the truth was she'd been running away from Lena since their relationship officially ended. Pretending she hadn't been dreaming about Lena on a weekly basis. Pretending that she hadn't been turning her head every time she passed by a familiar head of raven locks, only to be disappointed. Pretending that Sam didn't have an array of updates about Lena if only Kara would open her mouth.

Pretending and pretending and pretending. Kara wasn't even sure how she managed to pretend for so long now that Lena's reappearance in her life had opened up a floodgate of feelings.

"Then go get her, Kara Danvers," Lionel hissed, sounding loud and firm for the first time since she saw him again. She blinked at his assertion. "Get your girl. Get our girl."

Chapter Text

Contrary to popular belief, Kara did not kiss Lena first. Yes, Kara had been the one to ask her out for a date, which eventually turned into many dates, and then marriage, and then collapsed into a divorce. Yes, Kara had been the one who knelt on one knee on Thanksgiving, amidst a trove of trees and in front of firewood, with the nocturnal animals as witnesses, and asked Lena to marry her.

But Kara had not been the one who kissed her first. To the day of her death, Lena would insist that if she hadn't gathered the courage to kiss Kara that day, they wouldn't have been where they were today. To the day of her death, Lena wouldn't be certain as to how exactly she found the bravery to make the first move and unleash an array of passion and an age of incomparable love between two ordinary girls.

And it went like this.

It went like a second date. A drive-in movie date, in Alex's first car with Kara's careless driving under Lena's careful gaze. It went like a boring romcom, which had no substance and no good characters worth getting attached to.

It went like the two of them going from watching the movie to sitting on the trunk of the car, moongazing with the movie as white noise.

It went like Lena staring mindlessly at Kara. Freckles and blue eyes and glasses and impeccable fit that it was very curious how she was still single. Bright smile that was not dimmed by pouring rain and blonde hair that glimmered under the moonlight and the huge screen behind them.

It went like Lena losing her impulse control and sitting up abruptly, shocking Kara into silence.

"Can I kiss you?" Lena had asked, because consent was important – her mother taught her that much.

It went like Kara gaping at her. Truly. Mouth opened like a goldfish and eyes so wide it's a miracle her eyeballs didn't pop out, though that would be gross. Still, gross as it would be, Lena wasn't certain she wouldn't still find Kara hot as fuck, though maybe a little blinder than expected. And then Kara nodded.

It went like Lena leaning forward, refusing any sense of propriety or cowardice. Their mouths met. Closed at first. Then Kara opened her mouth, teasing her tongue at the edge of Lena's crevices. And it was all, as they would say, history.

Three years later, the kiss felt…renewed. A dying ember that was reignited. It was more than just a kiss. It was a reawakening. And Lena could only keep running.

With Lionel's improvement, Lena had no choice but to return to National City. No more avoiding phone calls or texts. No more pretending that wild romp in the forest didn't happen. No more acting as if the emotional turbulent she'd been through for the past two weeks was simply because of her father's condition.

Well, sure, but she could try her very best to avoid meeting Kara at all. She opted out of all shifts in ER, because while her father may be improving, he was still a pretty good leverage. She rejected dinner invitations that would potentially involve the firefighter, citing exhaustion and heavy workload after two weeks of missing work.

Even when she finally met Ruby, it was without Kara or Alex's presence. Say what you want about her, but you couldn't deny that Lena was exceptionally at escaping ghosts, even the ghosts are very real people. Or one ghost. One person.

Ruby was a toddler. Tiny. Only as tall as the bottom part of Lena's thigh, and Lena was short. A wary toddler who never relinquished a teddy bear in her arm, which Lena could relate with, considering her teddy bear was still sitting on a shelf in her childhood bedroom. Adorable. And surprisingly, the toddler took to Lena almost instantly. Wide-eyed. Good-natured smile. Constant curiosity in her eyes.

"Are you gonna tell me what happened?"

Lena briefly looked up from watching Ruby play with the little chess set that she had gotten her. "What happened?"

Sam raised her brows, a fond smile on her face as she watched her best friend and her new daughter. "Let me paint the picture: I got the call from you. I got concerned, and I was pretty sure Kara would be concerned too, so I told her immediately. Except I didn't think she would be so concerned to the point where she would steal my car and drive hundreds of miles to see you." Well, the woman was definitely still miffed about missing her car for two days. "So, like I said, what happened?"

Lena gulped and turned back to the toddler, picking up a knight and placing it on the board. Then she started arranging the pieces. "Nothing happened," she said, giggling a little when Ruby stared at the arrangement of the pieces in absolute awe. "Kid's a genius."

"One day, she might beat you."

"I look forward to it."

"Lena," Sam pronounced sternly, getting the woman to look at her again. "I know Ruby's adorable. She's too young to learn chess, still. Let her be."

"My mother taught me chess at five."

"You're a weirdo."

"Rude," Lena grumbled, and tickled Ruby under her chin, grinning wider as the girl giggled happily and proceeded to tumble into Lena's lap, unabashedly wrapping Lena's arms around her. "Oh, I'm stealing her," she stated, tightening her arms around the girl. "You're wonderful."

"Did you sleep with her?

Choking on air. That was a real thing. Lena would know, because she was experiencing it right this moment. She choked so hard that Ruby decided to squirm away from her and return to the chessboard, as if she could absorb its mechanisms by just intensely glaring at it.

"With Ruby? What kind of a weirdo do you think I am?" Lena exclaimed.

"Not Ruby, for god's sake. Kara!"

"Oh, her."

Sam's brows rose higher, obviously expecting more than just two words from Lena. But the raven-haired woman paid her no mind and proceeded to take out the little booklet that came with the chessboard. She pointed at the pieces and read their names out loud, much to Ruby's intelligent delight.

"I'm taking her to the lab with me."

"I'm not letting you ever see her again if you don't tell me what happened," Sam threatened.

Lena rolled her eyes, realizing that there was no way she'd be leaving this apartment today without telling Sam at least something. She could only hope that Sam wouldn't be a blabbermouth to the woman with whom she shared this child with.

Gingerly, she placed the booklet in Ruby's hands, making sure the kid wouldn't put it in her mouth. She could only smile wider when Ruby only attentively started reading, as if those words would make sense to a five-year-old. Then again, she'd already displayed an odd interest in the chessboard without much prompting, so Lena probably shouldn't be surprised if Ruby ended up grasping the concept soon.

"Thank you, Aunt Lena," Ruby politely said as Lena got up.

And dear god, the woman could melt right there. Instead, she just made her way to the couch and snatched a throw pillow from her best friend's hands, cuddling into it and sticking her tongue out when Sam made a noise of protest.

"Technically, I didn't sleep with her." Sam squinted, and Lena made a grimace, fidgeting on the couch. "I – well, it was – there was no sleeping." Sam only squinted more. "You remember the forest where she…proposed to me?" Her thumb absentmindedly rubbed the ring finger, where the ring tan had long disappeared.

"Uh-huh."

Lena shrugged and waited for it all to sink in. Soon, it would all sink in soon. And when the sinking happened, Lena hoped she would have found a way to sink herself into the depths of this very comfortable couch.

"No, you did not."

There it was, and still, Lena had failed to sink into the couch. She shrugged again. "We did." Before Sam could say anything, Lena went on, "We did. Like twice. And it was – I don't know. I've been avoiding her for like one week now." Sam hummed in acknowledgement. "I don't know how to face her."

"You've slept with plenty of people, and you stayed friends with them."

"Okay, no need to make me sound like a whore."

They both look at Ruby, who was mumbling to a rook. Okay, so far so good. They were going to have to be a bit more careful from now on.

"You can't avoid Kara forever. You're Ruby's godmother."

A protest ready at her mouth, Lena shifted in her position to tell Sam all the ways she could actually avoid Kara Danvers. Only to stop without saying a word as she finally absorbed Sam's statement. She closed her mouth and stared at Sam.

That was all she was doing for the next ten minutes. Ruby mumbling to chess pieces and making small cheers as she clumsily moved them. The faucet dripping in the kitchen. Occasional sirens on the streets to indicate emergencies that didn't require her or Sam at the moment. All those, and also Lena staring at her best friend, absolutely gob smacked.

"Damn it, I owe Kara 50 bucks," were the first words Lena said once she composed herself enough. The smug look on Sam's face changed into a confused one. "She bet that you'd get me to be Ruby's godmother."

"And you thought – you seriously thought I wouldn't?"

"Well, I haven't exactly been around, have I?"

"You were always around when it mattered," Sam said softly, reaching out to grasp Lena's hand. "Though now I might have to reconsider now that you told me you did it in a forest."

"Stop it."

"Honestly, think about the wildlife."

"We weren't exactly thinking."

"Yeah, I can tell."

"It's a one-time thing. That's it." Sam made a face that was very telling of her skepticism at Lena's claim, to which Lena only asserted, "It was!"

Sam sighed, moving closer to wrap an arm around Lena's shoulders and pulling her into her long embrace, because if Sam was anything, she was long. Lena didn't resist and just placed her head in the crook of Sam's neck, suddenly feeling so tired from all the pent-up anxiety over the past two weeks.

"It's a one-time thing," she mumbled, unsure as to whether she was trying to convince herself or Sam.

Before the tentacles of slumber took over her state of mind, she heard Sam whisper, "Sometimes, I wish you'd stop lying to yourself so much."

Well, that too. But for now, she would stay in Sam's arms and listen to her future goddaughter mumble more to herself. For now, she would continue pretending until she couldn't.

The ER was unusually slow today, but there was no way any of the staff would say that out loud. Still, it was uncommonly peaceful; there were empty bays, no sirens filled up the doors, no one crying about a dying parent. Some nurses were even playing Candy Crush on their phones.

Lena walked towards one of the bays that were not empty, summoned by a text from Alex. Despite her very best, there was just no way she could avoid the ER forever – she'd signed the contract as both a neurosurgeon and a trauma surgeon, so she would have to fulfil her obligations if she wanted the paycheck.

She came to a sudden halt after the drapes were drawn back and she was confronted with an unusual sight before her. It was starting to shape up to an unusual day in the ER with this added to the list. Sidling up to Alex, she kept her eye on the patient and cleared her throat.

"Is that an anal plug?" she asked as quietly as possible, although the patient probably wouldn't hear her.

Alex nodded, her face expressionless, though her ears kept twitching, so at least Lena could tell she was somewhat amused.

Lena licked her lips and asked again, "In his ear?"

Again, Alex nodded, her ears twitching more.

Lena inclined her head, taking a deep breath to suppress the bubble of laughter that was welling up in her chest. No, it would be unprofessional to laugh in the face of a patient, especially one who looked as distressed as the one sitting on the bed.

Mustering her professional voice, she offered what she hoped was a friendly smile and immediately went to the boy's other side. One glance at the chart told her that he was sixteen years old. A boy…with an anal plug in his ear. Briefly, she asked the nurse whether his parents were here, who told her that they were on their way.

"Charlie, you wanna tell me what happened?" she asked as she checked his vitals and pupil response, while Alex ran on the monitor.

"Is my boyfriend here?" Lena looked back to the nurse in askance, who could only shrug, so she waved her hand, silently ordering the nurse to go check. "We were trying things out." At sixteen? Lena remembered paying full attention to the decathlon team at sixteen, not messing around with plugs. "And I kind of fell on it."

"You what?" Alex asked, distracted from the stats.

"The plug was on the bed, and we were fooling around. And we were laying down, and it just kind of…" he drifted off, trembling fingers gesturing at the object in his ear. "We were just fooling around," he sniffled.

"Boyfriend's here," the nurse announced from her quest.

There was a mixture of panic and relief flooding Charlie's face. "Okay, um, can you get him to go home? I don't want – my parents don't know. And they're like…big Christians. Full-on."

Lena and Alex shared a look. Of understanding. Of sympathy. Of empathy. Of unavoidable sadness for a boy who was more scared than ever. They had both gone through the same thing with their own sets of parents, so they would know what it was like.

"Okay, what do you want us to tell your parents?" Alex asked softly.

The relief was soon overshadowed by the panic as soon as Alex asked the question. He shook his head and went from sniffling to actually crying. Big drops of tears tracing down his cheeks as Charlie struggled to find an answer that wouldn't get him in trouble.

"Pencil," Lena offered. "We can say it's a pencil. Is that okay?"

He softened and nodded. "Thank you."

Lena smiled gently and patted his arm. "We'll take care of you."

For the next couple of hours, Lena and Alex did nothing but take care of Charlie, leaving the rest of the ER in the capable hands of the other nurses and medical officers, only hoping that the ER would stay as peacefully as possible. Quietly, of course, because no one would dare to say it out loud.

The doctors brought him up for a CT scan, contacted an ENT to survey the damage to his ear, and performed a fairly painless procedure to extract the anal plug. When the ENT snorted at the sight of Charlie, Alex threw a glare so impressive that the six-foot-four man practically shrank into a dwarf.

Charlie's parents eventually came. And true to her word, Lena told them that it was a pencil and made up some excuse about him studying so hard that the pencil found its way into his ear. She even made Alex and any other nurses swear to say the same thing, still remember the way she'd been so afraid to come out to her family back in the day.

"You know, your parents seem very worried about you," Lena said when they were alone in the ward, the parents having gone to the cafeteria to fetch him some food.

"Yeah, they are," Charlie lamented, playing with his wristband. "But they're still – we go to church every Sunday. There's a Jesus portrait in our living room. I don't know."

She hummed and replaced the chart at the foot of his bed. He nodded when she gestured at the empty chair by the bed, so she sat down. "I was scared to tell my parents too," she said, smiling when he seemed startled at her revelation. "I didn't even tell them until I met the woman I was going to marry."

"How old were you?"

"20." He made an impressed noise. "I met her when I was eighteen, and she was…" Lena drifted off, recalling the way Kara had to make herself as small as possible under the awning of the bus station, and couldn't help but laugh at the memory. "She was clumsy and charming and blonde as heck, and I didn't know any other way but to fall madly in love with her."

"She sounds nice."

"She does, doesn't she?" Lena leaned back in the chair and swallowed. "We were together for two years. And one day, I realized that I could never leave her, which meant I could never keep her a secret from my parents forever." Good lord, she'd been so young then. "Fortunately, I was already working on the side while studying to become the doctor you see me as today, so I had savings and I could take care of myself, in case my family did kick me out of the house."

"Did they?"

She shook her head. "They were the best. My father was shocked, yes. He didn't talk to me for like two days. I think my mother talked to him about it, and in the end, they love me the way I am."

"Are they religious?"

"They're doctors in their own rights."

Charlie chuckled sardonically and shook his head. "Well, my parents –"

"I would never tell you to come out to your parents just because I did. I would never tell you to come out. Period. Everyone goes through their own pace, and if yours is never, then that's fine. I'm certainly not in the position to tell you to do anything, except to not stick anything else in your ear," she quickly explained, imploring him to understand. "But, if in the future, you do wanna come out, my advice would be for you to set things up for yourself. Make sure you have a safe space. Make sure you can…continue surviving in spite of them. That's all I'm saying."

The kid – the teenager, who was so fearful that he wouldn't allow the person he loved to see him – studied for a long moment before inclining his head. "Thank you, Dr. Luthor."

She smiled reassuringly at him and stood up. "Remember, no more things up your ears."

"Yes, ma'am." She was near the door when he asked, "Are you and your wife happy?"

Lena turned to look back at him, finding the hope in his eyes. The absolute wonder at the idea that two women, people like him, could end up together. Could sign a piece of paper and be recognized as spouses under the eyes of the law.

For a moment, she wanted to tell him the truth. Not all things had happy endings, but that didn't mean he couldn't have one. But the look on his face was so young and innocent, much like the way she was when she thought getting married would be the endgame for her and Kara, that there was no other ending for them.

So instead of being honest, she nodded at his query, reaffirming his belief in the wrong thing. It wouldn't do him any harm anyway. Maybe it would help him be braver in the future. Maybe he wouldn't remember her at all in the near future.

"I've been looking for you."

"What – what are you doing here?"

"Looking for you."

Slim fingers reached up to tug down the sunglasses that shielded tired green eyes. She looked at the woman blocking her sun, all blonde and sunshine in her own right, dressed up in a fitting button-down and a pair of straight jeans that somehow still managed to bring out the shapeliness of her legs.

"This park is nowhere near your station."

"Yes, and look what you made me do," Kara complained goodheartedly, moving to sit next to Lena on the bench. "I just finished a long shift – it was a long night, by the way – and you made me come all the way to Sand Cove Plaza to look for you."

Lena moved away slightly, unwilling to let any part of her touch any part of Kara. She didn't need the memories and she didn't need the echoes of her own pleas in the forest ringing in her ears. Just dreaming about them almost every night was humiliating enough.

"I was running from you," Lena blurted out, looking away from Kara.

Kara only nodded and shrugged. "Yeah, I figured." She followed Lena's gaze to the ducks swimming in the pond, chuckling at the kids blatantly ignoring the sign to not feed bread to the animals. "Look, can we talk?"

"About?"

"Lena, you're not stupid."

The double-board certified doctor clenched her fists in the pockets of her coat, almost crushing the sunglasses she'd deposited in one of them. "I think I like it better when you're angry with me." Even without looking, she could tell Kara was rolling her eyes and slumping back into the bench. "I owe you fifty bucks."

"For what?"

"Sam wants me to be Ruby's godmother."

Kara chortled at Lena's honest and proceeded to thrust a hand into Lena's vision, fingers wiggling. "I told you. Pay up, Dr. Luthor."

Lena sighed, though slightly grateful that she managed to distract Kara. Even for just a little bit. She dug into her purse and fished out a $50 note, making sure to slap it into Kara's palm to show her dissatisfaction at the situation. Dissatisfaction that she lost a bet, not that she would become Ruby's godmother.

"How's the kid with the anal plug?" Lena gasped and snapped her head to the right to gape at Kara. "I brought him in," Kara further explained. "He wouldn't tell us how that happened though."

So then, Lena proceeded to tell Kara the long-and-short of it. The fooling around. The boyfriend. The religious zeal. The short conversation she had with Charlie before she left him in the care of the next doctor on shift.

While she was talking, the humor on Kara's face dissipated. Little by little. Until there was only heartbreak and pity, a mist over her eyes.

"You think he's gonna tell them?"

"Not anytime soon," Lena predicted. "I wouldn't have told my family if it wasn't for you."

She clenched her fists harder at her own accidental confession. Then again, was it a confession if Kara already knew? No, it was more like an accidental reminder. She wanted to break skin for her lack of filter in effect of her exhaustion of working a long shift herself. And maybe also from all the running and pretending she'd been doing.

And it went like this.

It went like Lena looking down her lap while Kara was looking into the side of her head. More like burning her gaze into the side of Lena's head. Though, because she was stubborn, she refused to meet Kara's eyes.

It went like her desperately hoping that Kara would not bring it up. Would not bring any of it up and leave it in the past. Be it a spur of the moment thing or just understanding Lena was unwilling to talk about it at all. Just leave it in the past.

It went like her being so desperate that she wanted to wish it all away. Like that Marvel movie, where the purple giant would snap his fingers and half of the world would be dusted away. She would prefer that she be dusted away, instead of Kara.

It went like her entire body remembering each and every inch of Kara's curves, all slotted nicely into hers. Like two puzzle pieces that had finally found each other since packed into a nicely wrapped box. But this wasn't nice. This was messy as hell.

"So what do you think about Ruby?"

It went like Lena heaving a breath of relief, so heavy that there was no way the blonde next to her didn't at least hear her, if not feel the way her body pretty much collapsed to the frame of the bench.

It went like Lena having never been so grateful for how well Kara knew her. And she kept pushing on her crusade of pretending, talking about the toddler she was teaching to play chess, instead of the thing that had been haunting her dreams since it happened in the woods.

Chapter Text

"I hate you."

Kara blinked and watched as Alex rounded the table to sit in front of her, plonking of a cup of steaming hot coffee ungraciously on the surface. She blinked again once she noticed the impressive glower the redhead had on her face, almost as if she wished she could kill Kara by glaring at her alone.

"Of course, sometimes, I don't deny that I can be pretty hate-able," she offered. Then she leaned in, eyes narrowed. "For what exactly?" she asked a little conspiratorially.

"I had to hear from my wife that you slept with Lena," Alex said with a pout. "You're a horrible sister."

Kara froze in her seat, probably bewitching the baby near her, judging by how he kind of froze as well, only blinking rapidly at the strange blonde lady in front of him – not that she cared at the moment. She sucked in a breath and recalled her last encounter with the aforementioned doctor, sitting the park and pretending nothing happened.

"Technically, there was no sleeping."

"Apparently, that's what she told Sam as well."

Well, she really couldn't be blamed for the actual speechlessness that she descended into. After all, she wasn't under the impression that Lena was willing to remember one bit about it, let alone talk about it to anyone.

Not after that heartbreaking non-conversation they had in the park. It was that conversation that had kept Kara awake all night, failing to come up with ways to woo Lena again without mentioning that specific romp in the forest. She had stayed awake, wondering what she'd done wrong for Lena to be so avoiding about it all.

"I didn't think she'd want anyone to know about it," Kara admitted, slouching in her chair, and went on to recount what had happened at the park. "She was obviously pretending it all didn't happen, so I just went with it."

"She didn't get the memo."

"Then why didn't she want to talk to me about it?"

"You know her better than anyone."

She leaned back in her chair and flashed the baby a sad smile before turning back to her sister.

Did she really know Lena better than anyone? Five years had gone by, things had changed, and those things included them. One was an accomplished doctor and the other was no longer a trainee firefighter.

Even when the two of them had been married, Kara would sometimes come home and find herself in awe of a new angle of Lena that she had never seen before, be it a grumpy Lena, a tired Lena, a Lena learning to cook so Kara would no longer come back to takeovers only.

It always seemed like Lena was a constant shifting façade, and it was one of the reasons Kara had been so in love with her. The raven-haired woman was a refreshing experience every day, and truthfully, even presently, she craved to learn more.

"I want her back," she confessed to the second person who would know of this, the other still recuperating in Metropolis, not brave enough to meet her sister's gaze.

Despite the calls of orders, the conversations around them, some argument a few tables away, it seemed like Kara could still hear a pin drop with her sister's silence towards her confession. The blonde played with handle of her cup of hot chocolate, uncertain of what the silence for once.

She wouldn't be surprised if Alex was judging her. Kara had made a lot of good decisions because Alex was judging her. Except…she wasn't sure what kind of decision she would make if Alex was truly judging her for this – maybe she would, for once, ignore her sister's judgement and go forth with her pursuit of Lena again. Come hell or high water.

Gosh, she couldn't remember a time she had wanted a person this badly. Loved a person so much that it hinged on obsession.

"Well, it's about time." Kara snapped her head up, startled at her sister's nonchalant response. Alex only shrugged. "Kara, you have always been wanting Lena. I feel like you've been yearning for her even before you met."

"That bad?"

"No, Kara," Alex whispered, leaning her elbows on the table. "You just never fell out of love."

"What do I do?"

"You know I can't answer that," Alex sighed and patted Kara's arm comfortingly. "You'll figure it out."

Kara hated that answer, but she also knew that was the only answer she should expect. She sipped on her hot chocolate.

"Can I tell about it?"

"Absolutely not."

"She was just…really good."

"I swear to god, Kara."

"I don't know if Sam does it, but there's this thing Lena does that's like phenomenal."

"Kara."

Alex may not have given her much of an answer. She may not be very enthusiastic to let Kara talk about that mind blowing experience that had reminded Kara of why her and Lena's relationship had never suffered from intimacy issues.

Regardless of all that, Kara still felt like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.

Telling Lionel Luthor was one thing – he was largely detached from her personal life, except for that one major part where the person she really wanted to wake up with was his daughter. But telling Alex was something else all together. Her sister was her confidante, and it was just wrong to not tell her about this. Plus, it was always a comfort to know that no matter what, Alex would always be there to listen.

To be perfectly honest, Kara didn't know where to go beyond admitting that her heart had never let go of Lena. She had spent the last three years suppressing the irrepressible feelings, convincing herself, rather successfully at that, that she had moved on.

Yeah, sure, she had moved on, which was why she hadn't so much as glanced at a man or woman for the past five years. Well, not a single person who had anything other than raven black locks and sharp cheekbones. And then she would see the stranger's eyes and realized they weren't Lena, because only Lena had those sharp green eyes.

And then three years later, Kara Danvers made the impulsive move to visit her former in-laws and confessed that she was still in love with her ex-wife to her ex-wife's father.

It was almost as if her life was bad soap opera, and she had no way of rewriting anything.

Things had happened and she was here and she had no idea what to do beyond that. Even two days ago, when she had tracked down Lena at the park, she hadn't exactly been sure of what she wanted to say or do. Unfortunately, Lena had made that decision for her by being unusually elusive.

The last time she had been so lacking of direction was when her parents had passed away and she'd been told that the kind Danvers would be taking care of her moving forward. Kara had been struggling of whether she wanted to run away and go with child services.

This time around, she didn't have options. Or rather, she didn't know what options she had.

Before she knew it, she was 24 hours into the shift, which meant she had 12 hours to go. And Kara was…bored. Not that she would say it out loud; she wouldn't wanna curse the whole station to such madness – call her superstitious or whatever, these things were real.

Kara had done her daily workout earlier. She had gone through some drills with Nia, and even given her some boy advice with regards to a dude named Brainy at another station, as if she was such an expert on romance. She had made dinner and some supper for the team and ribbed Barry about his crush on his fellow paramedic. Hell, she even managed to get some paperwork done with Sam.

Now, she was just bored. She could just head over to the sleeping quarters and grab a few hours of precious sleep before some drunkard would eventually drive into a tree. But her head was too busy and there was too much keeping her thinking for her to actually fall asleep.

"You alright?"

She looked up from her shoes to find Barry studying from the stairs that would lead to the conference room and Sam's office. Naturally, she nodded.

"Sure, why wouldn't I be?"

"You're gonna burn a hole through the floor if you keep pacing like that."

She looked back down to her shoes, realizing that she had been pacing in circles for the last – well, she didn't know how long, actually. What time was it, even? She glanced at the clock mounted on the wall and blinked, realizing that rather than 24 hours, she was 26 hours into her shift.

"I'm fine," she repeated, scratching at her brow and proceeding to sit behind the reception desk. "Totally fine."

"Yeah, I'm convinced."

"I'm not trying to convince you. I'm trying to convince myself."

"That's just sad."

"None of your business."

"Touchy."

He descended the stairs, an amused smirk across his face, and approached the desk, his hands shoved into the pockets of his pants. She sighed and slouched completely in the chair, like a panda bear that had no regard for etiquette or politeness as long as it was comfortable.

He lifted a hand to rest his chin in his palm, tilting his head a little. "Come on. Tell Uncle Barry what's wrong."

She and Barry hadn't known each other for long, especially not in comparison with people like Sam and Lily and James. They'd only met when Barry had joined Station 15 five months after she had, but for some inexplicable, she managed to hit it off with him. Impromptu karaoke, workout sessions, or even just hanging out in the sleeping quarters playing some stupid co-op game on their phones.

Of course, she had never talked to him about her love life before. Mostly because she didn't have one. Most of the time, she was listening to him pining after Caitlin or mooning after the latest short-term girlfriend he met, but mostly it was about Caitlin.

"What do you think about Lena?" she asked.

His smile dimmed a little, probably because he was a little confused by her odd question. "Well, I've only met her once…" he drifted off, narrowing his eyes at her a little. "She seems intense. Good at what she does, given that even Caitlin and I have heard about her since paramedic training, but intense."

She hummed a little in agreement. "She does tend to give off that impression," Kara offered. "Wasn't always like that though."

"Is she the reason you never dated the whole time I've known you?"

"Is Caitlin the reason you never have long-term relationships?"

He gasped and placed a hand on his chest in mock offense. "Hey, this is about you, not me."

She giggled and threw a red stress ball at him, which he smacked back towards her easily. "You've gotten divorced before, right?"

His grin dimmed, but only slightly. He gestured at the ball in her hands, which she tossed back to him, and he just started to massage it. "Yeah, a couple of years ago." She hummed. "Unlike you, I still talk to her though."

"Hey, I talk to my ex-wife!" she protested.

"Yeah, after three years of not talking." Well, she had to give him that. "Then again, I'm not still in love with Iris."

Normally, Kara would deny it vehemently. Wildly. Like swinging her arms around and stuttering kind of denying. A clumsy denial, sure, but that was her brand – it was a wonder she was still surviving as a firefighter. But given that she'd admitted it to two people already, there really was no point denying it to her best friend in the station.

"So asking you for advice would be useless?" she asked.

"I think it's special," Barry said, shrugging. "You and Dr. Luthor," he added. "I mean, I don't know her, but I saw the way you sprinted out that day when you learned that her father had a heart attack. Not a lot of people still care like that."

"She is special."

"I would say go after her, but that would make me kind of a hypocrite, right?"

She laughed and easily fetched the ball that he tossed at her. "Let's just agree that we're both useless," she said, tossing the ball back at him.

"But remember that consent is important."

"I taught you that."

Before they knew it, Kara and Barry were just tossing a stress ball back and forth without any motive whatsoever. The only illumination they had was the orange streetlights outside, because Sam had suddenly instilled a policy of conserving energy out of nowhere.

No matter, because this was kind of nice, just tossing a ball back and forth. Focused on nothing but the ball. To make sure she didn't miss the ball or toss the ball in the wrong direction. Eye on the ball. Eye on the goal. Eye on the woman who would complete her again.

She didn't know who, but someone must have said it. With only four hours left of their shift, someone had, in the middle of a peaceful Station 15, complained about the day being too quiet or something. Otherwise, Kara and her team wouldn't be coming in and out of the station like a busy subway station, handling all kinds of cases in the middle of the night.

No one would admit it; they probably knew that they'd be pummeled for it.

By the time that dawn finally broke, Kara was truly broken. Even Sam, who used to drive the truck, had relegated the job to Winn, choosing to sit in the back. Just fifteen minutes more, and their shift would be over and they could all go home to sleep the horrible night off.

All the firefighters were pretty much running on fumes as they descended the vehicles and cleaned up after themselves. Kara and Sam handled the inventory pretty quickly, planning to grab a cup of coffee before heading home, only to stop short when they saw the intruder in the reception area.

"Long night?" Lena asked, a shy smile stretching her lips.

Kara and Sam looked at one another for a beat and turned back to the doctor, nodding with simultaneous groans. Lena chuckled, but didn't say anything else. In fact, she seemed uncertain as she stood in unfamiliar territory. She had never been here before, Kara recalled.

For some reason, Sam seemed to understand something that neither Kara nor Lena did, choosing to squeeze Kara's shoulder before saying, "Well, I'm beat. Gonna go home to my wife and see my daughter. Why don't you take Lena on a tour? Show her around."

Kara could hardly protest as Sam moved to give Lena a brief hug, mutter something into her ear, and walk up the stairs to her office, leaving the two of them alone.

In the next few moments, the blonde couldn't help but notice the way the doctor eyed her from head to toe, subtly gulping at the sight. Well, then, new information, Kara would have to clock that forever.

She cleared her throat and approached the woman, saying, "Sorry, I'm a bit of a mess." Though she clearly knew that Lena didn't see her that way.

"It's okay," Lena quickly said, shaking her head. "You look – you look good."

Kara quirked her brows. "You've seen me in uniform quite a lot of times. It was one of the things you yelled at me about when we got divorced."

Lena cleared her throat and laughed nervously. "Right, I think I was too clouded by resentment to appreciate…how good you look," she stammered.

There was no denying. Even with the exhaustion crawling through her bones and the lethargy slithering in her brain, the electricity was unmistakable. A sort of current that Kara had long thought to be gone and irretrievable ever again.

She stood before a blushing Lena, appreciating the red of her lips and the green of her eyes. And she wanted. She wanted. She wanted. Instead of taking what she wanted though, she forced her hands into her pockets and willfully paid no mind to the heat in her veins, like the devil over her shoulder to be impulsive for all the wrong reasons.

Fortunately for her – or maybe even a little unfortunately, if she were to listen to the devil over her shoulder – the door behind her swung open, and in walked the rest of the crew. They were all groaning and muttering complaints, cursing whoever it was that had cursed them for the last few hours of madness.

She had to refrain from rolling her eyes when Lucy, James, and Barry gave her knowing looks, but was relieved when James and Lucy didn't hesitate to hug Lena, greeting her like the old friends they were. Kara went on to introduce them to each other, blatantly ignoring the way they were giving the two of them weird looks as they went their own way.

"Let me show you around."

"Oh no, I don't wanna – you seem exhausted."

"I am," Kara easily admitted, gently tugging on Lena's elbow for her to follow. "But I've seen the place you work at. Only fair for you to have a look at my house."

She smiled wider when Lena chuckled. For the next twenty minutes, she did as she intended, showing Lena around the station that they didn't usually open up to anyone. However, Sam had pretty much given her blessing, so to hell with it.

It felt nice. To just walk around the building she would consider her second home with the woman she still cared so much about. To show her the other place where she could be herself without shame and allow her to perform a duty that was truly honorable. It made her feel oddly proud, seeing the way Lena appeared to truly appreciate the structure.

After all, previously, they'd spent too long resenting each other to appreciate their work. This felt like a fresh start.

They stopped at the sliding pole and looked down, where it was still quiet, before those from the B shift would come in to take over. She wrapped her palm around the cylindrical object and wiggled her brows at her ex-wife.

"Wanna have a try?"

"Kara, you know I'm scared of heights."

The blonde scoffed and wrapped a leg around the pole. "Please, it's not that high," she said dismissively, but then went reassuring. "I'll catch you. I promise."

Lena raised her brows. "You made that promise on our wedding day."

Inevitably, just as she did with any thought or mention of their previous relationship, her heart soured slightly at the recollection. She made so many promises, and she hadn't even realized that she'd broken them all the day Lena asked for a divorce. Or perhaps she broke them all the moment she agreed to the divorce.

"Help me keep it then," Kara said quietly.

At that, Lena froze, and the words took on entirely new meaning. Then again, Kara didn't really mean it to be as simple as catching Lena at the bottom of the pole anyway.

She'd been thinking about this since she got into the car and drove away from Luthor manor. Remembering things that she'd long suppressed, like the proposal and their wedding day and their vows. Her vows, to be specific.

Three years ago, Lena had been desperate for Kara to catch her, and Kara had been too blind by her own rage to see it. She'd broken that, and subsequently, all of them as their relationship deteriorated. She would never claim to have been the best wife, but she hadn't tried in the last days of their marriage.

"Kara, please," Lena pleaded, taking a small step away from her and the pole.

"What are you so afraid of?"

However, even after three years, Kara had never forgotten the vows she'd broken. She could still recite them, word by word. How could she not, when she'd spent a whole night writing them, thinking that she would mean every single syllable? She didn't keep them then, but she was older and wiser now – she would very much like to keep them now.

"Do we have to go over it all again?" Lena scoffed, gazing at Kara with incredulity, as if the blonde was being absolute preposterous for even suggesting it.

Kara removed herself from the pole and shoved her hands into her pockets again, giving Lena the space that she so obviously needed. "Can we at least talk about that day?" Lena clenched her jaw. "You can't tell me it didn't mean anything."

"Why not?"

Kara's jaw dropped slightly. "It can't – wow, really?" she snapped.

"There's a reason we're divorced."

"We're so far past that."

"Maybe to you, sure," Lena barked.

"Didn't we have, like, angry conversations about this already?"

"That doesn't mean we can just sweep it under the rug!"

"What the hell does that mean?"

"It means looking at you still hurts, Kara!"

Kara did a doubletake at the accusation. No, not an accusation, a disclosure. She placed a hand on the railing as a mean to steady herself.

"I thought we're…friends," she muttered.

Lena brushed a hand over her face and groaned aloud. "I would like us to be," she replied, softer this time. "I thought I could be your friend…after so long. And it felt good, you know, when we were texting and talking and shopping for Ruby's stuff," she admitted with a sad smile and a shrug. "But then you came to the manor and my dad thought we were still married and it's all just so fucked up."

"Why?"

"Because what is all this, Kara?" Lena asked, raising her brows in askance. "I look at you, Kara, and I think of all the arguments we've had. All the things we've said of each other. Horrible things. All the times we've broken each other's hearts." She sighed and tugged at her ponytail. "I barely scraped it all back together when you left three years ago. I almost failed to pull myself together and rebuild my life after our divorce," she said, weak and exhausted. "You are – were – the best…and worst thing to have ever happened to me."

If it wasn't the banister, Kara was certain she would have toppled over, and still, the pain of the fall wouldn't overpower the pain from those words that hit at Kara like cannons. She could only tighten her grip over the banister.

"I think that's what love is," she whispered, but loud enough for the doctor to hear. Lena frowned, eyes wide still, surprised at Kara's choice of word. Kara nodded and gulped. "We were too young, then, I think. We couldn't…wrap our heads around the magnitude of our feelings for each other, and it got to us sooner than we could beat it." She pushed away from the banister and took a few steps closer to Lena. "But we're older now. We can – we've been through so much. Isn't that what growing up is? We learn and we adapt."

"It's not as simple as that."

"I'm not saying it is," Kara argued, gingerly reaching out and clasping onto Lena's forearm when the other woman showed no sign of resistance. "What exactly did you come here for, Lena?"

Lena clenched her jaw and shrugged. "Honestly, I don't know," she replied, her voice softening from the earlier vitriol that it carried. "I finished work and I found myself driving here. Before I knew it, I walked in the door. Could have walked out, but I didn't."

Kara licked her lips, attempting to find the words that would not only reassure Lena, but also reaffirm her of her conviction to this. She squeezed Lena's forearm, prompting her to meet her eyes. That was the only thing she knew how to do in the years they'd been together.

Everyone had always told Kara that her eyes always betrayed her. Well, this time, perhaps they were the only things that could help her.

"I know there were bad times. Trust me, I was there," she added with a scoff, a little glad to find Lena amused at the reminder as well. "But there were good times too. For most of it, we were the happiest anyone could have been."

"That didn't last long, did it?"

"Like I said, we were young and immature back then."

"Are you saying you regret proposing to me?"

Kara rolled her eyes, finding herself slightly annoyed at Lena's habit to nitpick everything anyone ever said. "Stop turning this against me," she grumbled. "If there's anything I regret, it's that I loved you so much but I couldn't pull myself together to keep you. Like I promised in my wedding vows." She stepped closer, placing her free hand on Lena's other forearm. "Lena, I can't forget that day in the forest never happened. I certainly can't pretend that it meant nothing."

"It was kind of gross."

"How dare you."

"Sam almost reconsidered making me Ruby's godmother because you and I had sex in the forest."

"Yeah, I can't believe you told her."

Together, they chuckled, attaining lightness amidst the utter ridiculousness of the situation they were stuck in. And then Lena sobered up slightly and closed her eyes, leaning her head closer to Kara's chin.

"What is this supposed to mean, Kara?"

If she could, Kara would just say those words and be done with it. She would throw it all to hell and just speak the three words to Lena and shake their worlds up again.

But what happened three years ago, heartbreaking as it was, was still a lesson that Kara had taken to heart in the days since. She wouldn't rush into things again. She wouldn't let herself be wrapped up in the fairytale elements of it all and forget about the reality that relationships could be difficult, painful, and frustrating if they weren't careful.

She couldn't go through that again. And she wouldn't let Lena go through that again, not if she could help it.

So instead of allowing impulse to take over, she only pulled Lena forward and wrapped her arms around the raven-haired woman, placing her chin on top of the woman's head. Thankfully, Lena was receptive to her overture, willingly tucking her head into the crook of Kara's neck and enclosing her own arms around Kara's shoulders.

"Let me keep my promise," Kara whispered, not at all knowing what would happen next. "Let me catch you."

Chapter Text

Creativity hadn't always been her strongest suit. Lena liked plans. Some would even say that she was a little too prepared for her own good, what with her preference for structures and well though-out processes. Being a doctor provided her with that stability, knowing that no matter what, a human body would remain the same, save for a few outliers.

She preferred to carry a notebook around with her and write down any sort of thing that came to mind, like a particular node in someone's brain that she could explore or the apples that she had to pick up before she went home for the day. She had a knack of heading to the OR schedule to find out what time she had to be in the OR, just so she could plan her day out.

The raven-haired woman was good at picking apart a brain without killing the owner of said brain. A gurney could be rolling in, and she would know off the top of her head what to look for first after getting briefed by the paramedic. She could convince herself that her ex-wife no longer mattered and go on with her life thinking that.

But what she totally sucked at was being creative.

She couldn't draw a flower to save her own life, nor write a short story without making it the most boring scientific explanation in the universe. She watched more documentaries than actual TV shows with drama and stories.

Look, Lena just liked knowing things ahead of time, and she shouldn't be faulted for that. Understanding that point A would lead to point Z, even with the other 24 alphabets in the timeline, was the essential part of life, in her opinion.

With an endgame, Lena could anticipate things.

Which was why she completely at a loss in the face of Kara Danvers begging her for another chance. As if the first time around hadn't bulldozed them so thoroughly that one of them had literally skipped town to avoid anything to do with the other, though Kara apparently liked to insist otherwise, according to Sam.

She never anticipated this. Not in a million years. Not since the divorce. Not when they saw each other again after three years. Not when they decided to be friends. Not even when they had sex in the woods.

And could she take the risk? Could she open up the gates locked up tight around her heart and risk having it trampled all over again? Perhaps the most important question was: Could she really look Kara in the eyes and pretend as if she felt nothing for the blonde?

Food intake was few and far between, especially on busy days. Doctors had long since learned to appreciate anytime they could sneak a meal in, which was why they were irrationally obsessed with snacks. And coffee – never forget about the coffee.

So when Lena finally got a break between the trauma cases they'd been flooded with tonight – a lot of people had decided to go really wild, which wasn't surprising, given that it was Friday – Lena discarded the gloves and her coat at the nurses' station and made her way to the vending machines that sold heavy snacks.

She fished her phone out along with the change needed, and was about to slot the cash in when she saw the unread message flickering on her screen. Actually, there were numerous texts that she didn't read, mostly from her workaholic brother, but she focused on the one. Singular, but stark.

Kara (3:46 a.m.): i hv bento n coffee

That was an hour ago. Surely, by now, Kara would have already gone home after an hour's worth of silence. For a moment, Lena simultaneously panicked and hesitated, because what if Kara got the wrong message from her silence? Before that, what kind of message did she even want Kara to receive? What did she herself even want?

Her fingers hovered over the screen, and then she decided to take a plunge. She hoped she would be caught, just as she was promised.

Lena (4:42 a.m.): Please tell me it's not latte.

Kara (4:43 a.m.): come outside n find out

She knew she had hoped that she would be caught, but now, she wasn't even certain that she wanted Kara to reply to her text at all. God, she hated not knowing what laid ahead.

Well, too late. Out of courtesy or whatever, Lena just had to meet Kara, in spite of the ungodly hour. Plus, bento sounded great, after the day she'd had. At least she could find satisfaction in the fact that, together, she and Alex had saved no less than 15 patients today.

It was late. Barely any visitors at this house. Hence, it was easy to spot Kara in the compound. Then again, Lena realized that she had yet relinquish the ability to spot Kara anywhere, regardless of distance or crowd. That was something to take into consideration.

She clenched her jaw and inhaled a bracing pocket of air, refusing to let herself succumb to Kara and her eyes and her damn uniform. Fuck that uniform. It should be illegal, for the love of god.

"Don't you have fires to put out or something?" she said in lieu of a greeting, sitting next to Kara on the bench but pointedly leaving certain distance between them.

"I won't look a gift horse in the mouth," Kara replied in lieu of saying the Q word, which Lena fully understood. "Coffee. Black. Because you're insane like my sister," she offered, handing a paper cup over to Lena.

The doctor frowned. "It's still warm."

The blonde only hummed in acknowledgement and placed a bento box on her lap. "Your bento, Your Highness."

Lena studied her ex-wife, who was staring at her with far too much effort in innocence that anyone with common sense could tell it was fake. She narrowed her eyes and took a sip of the coffee, and found that it was piping hot.

"How many coffees have you bought?" she questioned.

Kara rolled her eyes and slumped against the back of the bench. "Like three, I think."

Lena sighed, placing the cup on the space between her and Kara, and proceeded to open the lid of the bento, almost drooling at the sight of unagi and rice and even kale. "You shouldn't have stayed this long."

"I thought you'd be hungry."

"There are vending machines in the building."

"But do they have kale?"

"I don't need kale for every meal, contrary to your misguided belief."

"I wanted to see you."

Lena chewed on a piece of unagi. Slowly. Eyes focused on the food and not the woman who seemed like she had developed a habit of baring her soul to Lena since they met in college. She wasn't sure she liked it. One person shouldn't be so vulnerable with another.

She was vulnerable once. And her world was shattered as a result of it. Then again, the perpetrator was sitting right next to her.

"Do you remember our ninth date?"

Lena frowned, and she couldn't help but lift her gaze to the blonde. "You count our dates?"

Kara licked her lips. "I remember everything."

Oh, for fuck's sake. The raven-haired woman leaned back against the bench and tried her very best to not show how affected she was by the revelation. Inside though, her stomach was twisting, in anticipation of yet another unknown thrown in her direction.

Maybe she shouldn't have moved to National City at all. Metropolis was peaceful, despite the skyscrapers and the horrible people. She got to do her job and go home. Occasionally, she'd drive to the manor to see her family and help her brother out with some research. There were no ex-wives pestering her about reconciliation.

"Remind me," she relented.

Kara smiled and opened her mouth.

"I'm so sorry."

A small smile stretched at the edge of Lena's lips, guiltily amused at the way Kara had followed her words with a whine in the other room. She grabbed a clean towel from the cabinet under the sink and soaked it with cold water, then made her way back into the bedroom as she folded the towel into a smaller portion.

"You have nothing to be sorry for," she reassured softly, kneeling by Kara's bed and dabbing her face with the towel.

"I didn't – I didn't plan this." Kara made her point by waving a hand flimsily at her own general direction.

Lena hummed. "Of course not. No one plans to be sick."

"I had – I planned a picnic. There's a basket and baguette and stuff," she complained, frowning and moaning slightly in discomfort when Lena placed the towel on her forehead. "It's cold," she whispered, burrowing deeper under her comforter. "I'm so sorry."

"Stop apologizing," Lena prompted, settling on the floor and entwining their hands together. "You can't go to a picnic. You have a fever."

The blonde heaved a deep sigh. Loud and frustrated at her lot in life, as if having a fever was the worst thing in the world, and Lena found it so adorable that she had to place a soft kiss on the back of the girl's hand.

"I just wanted to romance you," Kara mumbled. "Sex you up and all."

Lena raised a brow, huffing a disbelieving chuckle. She waited until Kara could managed to open her eyes, even just a smidgen.

"Who said I'd have sex with you?"

Kara's frown deepened. "You don't?" she mumbled, and closed her eyes again. "Because I really wanna have sex with you. You're like…the hottest person I've ever met. I used to have this really hot teacher. She taught history. And I had the biggest crush on her. But you dethroned her. So easily."

Well, that was a lot of information, most of them Lena was sure Kara hadn't intended to say if she hadn't been sick. Lena hadn't seen this coming, the barrage of revelations that Kara had suddenly decided to bulldoze her with. Very interesting revelations, but unexpected.

As a rule, the younger woman didn't like not seeing things coming. Or surprises. The last time she had been surprised, her mother had drowned and she'd been orphaned.

As a rule, her father had also made it a habit to gently tell her off for being so closed off, telling her that she should at least try to open up more. Who knew if the next best thing would be just around the corner if she didn't look for it?

"I think I like it when you're sick," she offered softly.

"That's a mean thing to say."

"Do you keep asking me out on dates just because you want to 'sex me up'?" At this point, she might as well milk it.

The blonde was quiet for such a prolonged period of time that Lena thought she had fallen asleep, until she opened her eyes again to look at Lena. Despite the illness, her eyes were clear this time, bright blue even in the darkness of her room, what with the curtains drawn and lights shut off.

"I keep asking you out on dates because I've been enamored with you the second I met you. I don't know how to ask you to be my girlfriend, so I just keep asking you to dates. I want to keep seeing you. I just want to be near you all the time," she confessed, her words slurring here and there. "And I'm pretty sure I'm gonna regret saying all that when I get better, but apparently feverish Kara does not a quiet Kara make."

"I really like it when you're sick."

"You're so mean."

"For the record, I really like you too."

Kara replied with a soft snore, and Lena didn't even mind. She held onto the girl's hand and pillowed her head on the side of the bed with her free arm, watching the blonde who was too scared to ask her to be her girlfriend, even though Lena would have said yes without hesitation.

That was a little scary, to be honest. But maybe Lionel was right. Maybe the next best thing was around the corner, and it may have just been three months since they met, but Lena had a feeling that for once, opening herself up wouldn't be so wrong.

"You didn't even ask me to be your girlfriend until, like, four more dates later."

"You're very intimidating!"

Lena heaved a chuckle and continued eating her bento. Somehow, their encounter at the fire station had…switched up a few things. For example, she didn't feel as much heartache anymore when she thought about their past. Their period of getting to know each other and falling in love.

Even though Kara had been sick and Lena didn't get to on the picnic that the blonde had planned out, that date – if she could even call it that – had been one of the most daunting ones. She had gone home with a full mind and a warm heart, and she had spent two days not talking to Kara at all, because she was, like a typical coward, fearful of a good thing when it came slamming into her.

It was that very date when she realized that Kara Danvers was a force to be reckoned with, a wrecking ball that could either enhance her life or ruined it completely.

"I still mean it, you know," Kara whispered, much less humorous now. "I want to be near you all the time."

Lena inhaled deeply, deciding that the bento would have to wait, and looked up to find Kara studying her with a look so soft. A look that Lena had almost forgotten could be so simultaneously daunting and thawing. She had fallen in love with that look in the first place.

"Tell me something," she said. "How can you be so sure that we'd last this time around?"

Because if Lena hadn't been such a cautious person, she would have jumped into Kara's arms already. There wouldn't be so much back and forth, and she would allow herself to love Kara again. Wholeheartedly. Like a fool.

But she wasn't a fool. Lena was raised in a family of geniuses, overflowing with logic and knowledge. Her father had this quote framed in his study: 'The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again'. Lena wasn't insane. Then again, maybe she was for even letting the floodgates open to this very situation she was in right now.

Lena was no fool, but she was foolish enough to fall back in love with Kara Danvers. Or maybe she never did fall out of love – no one had ever said that Lena was particularly in tune with her own emotions. And yes, she wanted to be near Kara all the time, even in times she didn't want to.

"I've never loved anyone after you. I haven't even really dated anyone after you. For the last three years, I've been in National City, and you've been in Metropolis, and I – I kept looking for you," Kara confessed, moving a little closer to Lena on the bench. "How can it be anyone else if I can't stop looking for you?"

"That's all very romantic, Kara, but –"

"It's not about being romantic, Lena," Kara interjected, shaking her head. "It's about me finally understanding no matter how long it takes or how far apart we are, I can never love anyone else the way I love you."

Lena blinked at the three words that Kara had so easily blurted out.

"I can't promise you that there won't be fights. Or arguments. Or times where we don't want to tear our hair out over one another," Kara continued. "But right now, I'm promising you that I won't make the same mistakes I did three years ago. I'm promising you loyalty and unrelenting companionship. I'm promising you that you won't ever have to wake up doubting my feelings for you."

Again, all those things sounded very romantic, but Lena was still no fool.

"Give me more time."

Kara's expression fell at Lena's request, but she nodded anyway, shifting away from the raven-haired woman. "Okay."

Lena inclined her head and stood up, packing up the bento for later. "For the record, I want to be near you all the time too," she admitted.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

The first toy Lena had had was a teddy bear. Brown and fluffy. The generic toy store teddy bear that parents bought to appease their kids from monsters in the closet and creatures under the bed.

But it wasn't a generic teddy bear for Lena. Contrary to popular belief, Lena wasn't born into the Luthor family. She was born in an Irish cottage, delivered by an ancient midwife who was more superstitious than factual. The cottage was small, located in a small town, with a small population.

Her mother had a job as a store manager at one of the town's two restaurants, and she only ever made enough to pay for necessities and make sure her daughter was healthy. The teddy bear was a gift bought from tips collected over two weeks, and Lena called it Mr. Bean. Yes, very original of her.

That teddy bear now sat comfortably in her bed, tucked under the covers. It was simple, but one of the most important items in Lena's life.

And right now, as she gaped at the various bear toys available in the toy store, she developed a whole new appreciation for Mr. Bean. A kid really didn't need this many options just to cuddle at night and pretend that it could protect them from the evils of the world.

She braced herself, and leaned down to pick Ruby up in her arms. "Pick your favorite, Ruby," she prompted with a gentle smile, careful to secure Ruby in her embrace.

"That one," Ruby easily decided, pointing to a bear sitting in the second bottom row, light blue with a heart on its chest.

"That was easy. Are you sure?"

Ruby nodded vigorously, staring at the bear like it would her lifesaver. "That one, that one," she insisted.

"Alright, honey. The blue one, it is." She bent down, tightening her hold on Ruby, and took the bear, handing it to the kid. As she made her way to the cashier, she asked, "Do you want some ice-cream next?"

"Yes."

Lena smiled, placing a soft peck on the girl's cheek and gently prying the bear out of Ruby's grip to give to the cashier. "Don't tell your mother though." She dug out her card to pay for the bear.

"Which one?"

"Either one."

Once Ruby was the proud owner of a light blue bear with a heart on its chest, Lena started making her way to the nearest ice-cream shop, delighted at Ruby's rambles about weird things. Like the cupboards in the sky and the promises that the bear had made her in the short time they'd known each other.

They sat a table by the window, Lena with mint chocolate ice-cream and Ruby with strawberry ice-cream. The doctor had to warn her goddaughter against feeding the ice-cream to the bear, because Sam would definitely be displeased at having to throw that thing in the washer.

Alex (2:31 p.m.): did you kidnap my kid?

Lena (2:31 p.m.): I was permitted.

Alex (2:32 p.m.): no ice-cream

"Definitely don't tell your moms that I brought you out for ice-cream," she said, laying the phone facedown on the table and grinning as the girl nodded in promise. She watched as Ruby had one hand stroking the head of the bear while the other dutifully fed herself ice-cream, stains all over her lips. "Why this bear, Ruby?" she had to ask.

"Because I love her."

Lena raised her brows at the pronoun. "How could you be so sure?"

"I looked at her, and she looked at me. And I know she will protect me," Ruby easily replied, shrugging.

Lena tilted her head. "That simple?"

"Yes."

And that was the thing about kids, wasn't it? They were born pure and untainted, always such an innocent outlook on life. Innocence meant simple, and Lena was often jealous of them for being able to so…unworried. How did they do it?

"You know, I have a bear too," she offered. At that, Ruby looked up from the ice-cream to her godmother with interest. "His name is Mr. Bean, and he's been very good at protecting me."

"Mr. Bean?"

"Uh-huh. A bear should have a name."

"I don't know what to call my bear."

Lena nodded with grave understanding. "Take your time. This is serious stuff."

She watched with adoration as Ruby frowned at her bear, a finger on her chin. Kids were so simple. And Lena thought maybe it was okay to be simple time after time.

I know she will protect me.

That simple?

Yes.

Lena lied on her back in her bed, Mr. Bean on her chest. Her eyes were directed at the ceiling, but her mind was somewhere else. Actually, her mind was everywhere. Ruby. Her father. Kara. Her goddamn feelings.

Sometimes, she hated being a human being with feelings. She would very much like to be psychopath. That way, Lena could just do her job without emotional attachments. It would certainly make her life as a doctor easier. And she wouldn't be haunted by a damn ex-wife who bamboozled back into her life with no intention of leaving.

That simple?

Yes.

Unbelievable. She was letting a five-year-old steer her decisions. Unacceptable. She was goddamn adult, and double board certified at that. Unfathomable.

Fucking hell, she should never have left Metropolis. What was she thinking? Accepting that job offer, knowing full well that she would run into Kara eventually. And here she was, inviting unnecessary headache for absolutely no reason but her own stupidity.

That simple?

Yes.

Lena sighed loudly and sat upright, grabbing her phone from the nightstand and dialing before she could regret it.

"Hello?"

"One date."

A pause. "You won't regret it."

Even through the call, Lena could see it already, that big smile on Kara's face. Unable to help herself, Lena smiled too, hoping that she really wouldn't regret it.

Chapter Text

Paperwork was the worst. Inventory and numbers and reports. Man made and the only purpose was to drive people nuts.

Sometimes, Kara wished she wasn't so good at her job to get promoted to Lieutenant. She didn't think she would ever want to be a captain if that meant more getting stuck behind the desk to do paperwork and less going out to the field to do crazy shit so people would have a peace of mind. She looked up from her stack of reports to Sam, who looked like even ten cups of coffee wouldn't sustain her.

Yeah, maybe Kara should take it slow and let Sam be the leader that she was so good at. Then again, right now, her sister-in-law looked like she was about to put all the reports and data into the shredder and be done with it. Kara would support that if they wouldn't be risking their jobs over it.

She threw down her blue ballpoint pen and leaned back in her chair, saying, "I'm taking Lena out."

Sam loosened her tight grip on her hair and frowned at the blonde, tilting her head. "Like…you don't mean killing her, right?"

Kara choked on air and stood upright. "What? No! I mean on a date. I'm taking her out on a date. Jesus, Sam."

"Had to make sure."

They eyed each other for a really long moment, paperwork forgotten. Kara was overtaken with apprehension and doubt at having told Sam that, but Sam was pretty much unreadable. That was probably why she was made captain – her poker face was out of this world, almost rivaling Lena's.

And then Sam sighed, standing up to make her way over to the small table that Kara had been occupying in her office – they pretty much shared the office already, but no one ever said it out loud. She sat in the other chair and continued staring at the blonde, eyes narrowed and chin pillowed in her palm.

"We've had this conversation before," Sam started, a little too lazily to Kara's liking.

"Huh?"

"You dating my best friend. Me warning you of where I'll bury your body if you hurt her," Sam offered, gesturing airily with her free hand. "I remember very clearly, because I had never seen Lena so happy before. Back then anyway. She was humming. That woman never hums."

Kara gulped nervously. She did, indeed, remember that particular conversation. It was the only time she had ever been on the receiving end of a shovel talk. Well, actually, she got a couple of shovel talks. From Sam to Lex. There was even one outright threatening one from Andrea, which didn't help the animosity between them.

Lena didn't know it, but she was cared and she was loved. Always.

"I never thought I'd have to give two shovel talks to you."

Kara wanted to throw her head back and groan aloud, but seeing the sternness on Sam's face, she elected against it.

"Don't get me wrong – I like you two together. I've been rooting for you even when you two split." Sam crossed her arms, a frown across her forehead. "I didn't even – she wasn't exactly the best paragon of abstinence when you two were apart." Now, Kara was frowning, but she didn't dare interject. "I'm sure she told you about Andrea."

"That woman is a pain in my ass even when she's not around," Kara scoffed.

"Hey, that's my friend you're talking about," Sam admonished her, though not without a teasing smile. "I never really understood why you and Andrea just cannot get along."

"She's in love with Lena," Kara shot out, because it was the most obvious thing in the world, and she could never really understand why the others just couldn't see it. "I've known it the moment the I met her. Andrea Rojas is in love with Lena, and she doesn't even try to hide it."

"You haven't seen her for years."

"Okay, she was, and she didn't even try to hide it," Kara corrected herself with a pout. "I mean, she didn't even – she didn't hesitate to jump Lena the moment we got divorced. Yes, I know about that. Lena told me."

"Do you really think you have the right to be possessive?" Kara gaped at the captain, a little appalled at the bold question, but Sam didn't even falter, just staring at the blonde with her brows raised, like the mother she was apparently born to be. "You were divorced. I'd never seen Lena so heartbroken. I don't blame her for looking for avenues to forget that you just signed the papers without even trying to fight for your case."

"What –"

"Because honestly, I was pissed at you," Sam confessed, the mischief from before dissipating all together. "You moved here and you came into my fire station and I couldn't – did you know Lena had specifically asked me to be nice to you?" Kara frowned deeply. "Yeah, she called me after learning that you were moving here, and she pretty much instructed me to be nice to you. To pretend that none of that happened. Act as if you weren't the reason that my best friend was a whole damn mess."

"Sam –"

"Why didn't you fight for her?"

Leaning back in her chair, the lieutenant could only stare at Sam. Never had she ever seen Sam so upset before. With her. They'd always managed to remain cordial, even playful, with each other, despite their history. They were pretty much each other's work wife.

Honestly, she hadn't realized that Sam had been quite so unhappy with the situation, with her. Even angry, if she wanted to venture into that kind of language. Kara tugged at her ponytail a little and leaned back in her chair, recognizing that Lena and she weren't the only affected ones in their relationship.

"I didn't know how to," Kara admitted with a self-deprecating shrug. She clenched her jaw and cleared her throat. "Back then, I thought: How was I supposed to fight for a relationship that obviously wasn't working out anymore? We'd spent enough of our marriage fighting each other as it was."

"And you just got tired of her?"

She had to tread lightly here, Kara knew that, but she also knew that she had to be honest. This may been sudden, but she could tell that this was the culmination of years of unsaid words. Unvented resentment.

For a brief moment, she wondered why her sister never told her about any of this. Actually, did Alex even know that her wife had been upset to this extent?

"Not of her. I was just…tired," she whispered. "She wasn't the only one in pain, Sam," she continued explaining. "I couldn't – come on, Sam, you saw how I was."

Sam looked away, clearly remembering the state that Kara had been in during that first year. How she worked herself to the bone. Taking extra shifts just because she didn't want to go back to an empty apartment. Refusing to adopt a dog or a cat or even a freaking turtle because that had been the dream she had when she was with Lena.

"You had me. You had Alex. You had James and Lucy. She was – Lena was all alone in Metropolis," Sam said regretfully, brushing her hand over her face. "I think I mostly resented you because you left her all alone there. She had no one, except a narcissistic brother, a mother who didn't know how to show her love, and a father who's almost dying right now."

"I won't do that again." Sam narrowed her eyes at Kara's seemingly flimsy promise. "Sam, I never stopped loving her. I never stopped thinking about her. And I've learned the hard way what it's like to be without her. Trust me, I won't ever leave her again."

"And if you do?"

"Feel free to set me on fire."

"Alex would leave me for that."

Kara smiled a little. "I'm glad you told me all these." She sighed. "And I'm sorry, Sam."

"Yeah, well," Sam said with a shrug. "But I swear, Kara, Lena's my best friend. Hurt her like that again and I'll find so many ways to make your life a living hell."

The blonde nodded, and held out a pinky finger. Sam rolled her eyes, but she interlocked her pinky finger with Kara's anyway.

She stood at the bottom of Lena's building, trying her very best to not fidget in the outfit she'd put on. A dark brown blazer over a crispy clean black top, alongside a pair of slim fit black slacks. All those purchased only the day before, with careful scrutiny from Alex to get the best bang of her buck.

Sitting on a bench in front of the valet, she'd never felt more out of place. First of all, this building had a valet and a doorman. How extra was that? And she was pretty sure she saw a couple of plainclothes officer just wandering about the neighborhood, like they were giving the place extra security, as if the security detail itself wasn't enough.

All those ponderings were erased immediately when Lena finally emerged from the front doors, smiling at the doorman and the valet as she made her way to Kara. And the blonde, like the lovesick fool that she was, could only stare. Well, more like gape. She was gaping. When Lena had finally stopped in front of her, she was still gaping.

"Kara?"

Blinking rapidly, she shook out of her daze and sprang to her feet, gulping at the sight before her. "You look –" She gulped again and took Lena in, who had on a blush-shade dress that extended to her knees, hair up in a half-knot and leaving the rest over her shoulders – Kara wanted to devour her right there on the streets. "This is just unfair," she grumbled, forcing her hands into pockets so she didn't do anything untoward.

"What?" Lena asked, totally oblivious to the effect she had on Kara, or the passersby, for the matter.

Suddenly, the blonde felt a little like Neanderthal, wanting to wrap their woman up in shrouds of clothing with not a smidge of skin on display. Totally not nice of her and she should be better than this, but she thought it anyway.

She took in a deep breath to brace herself and held out a hand gingerly, smiling at Lena like a gentlewoman, though she was feeling anything but. She was feeling somersaults all over her nerve endings. Dragons in her stomach. Heat at the bottom of her stomach.

Kara could only exhale in relief when Lena didn't hesitate to take her hand, interlocking their fingers together. This was a step. This was a good step, Kara reminded herself. She tightened her grip on Lena's pale hand and breathed again, suddenly feeling peaceful at the touch.

How did she ever go this long without Lena Luthor?

There were probably other better planned first dates than the one she had planned. Those done by the one percenters. Helicopter flights or whatnot. Maybe even a dinner in Paris. If Kara could fly, she would probably do that for Lena too. She would bring Lena to space if she could.

However, Kara was but a firefighter, passionate about her job with only enough in her accounts for a few splurges throughout the year. She was comfortable, sure, but she certainly couldn't afford a two-way flight just to bring the woman she was in love with out for dinner. Plus, Lena probably had had enough of those to be amazed at the experience.

Displayed before them was a checkered blanket on the grass, a basket of food bought from Noonan's in the middle – Kara didn't want Lena to get food poisoning on their second-first date, after all – and a bottle of really expensive white wine that Sam had kindly gifted her from their stash.

Beyond the blanket and basket and wine, there was National City in the night, lit up by buildings and streetlights and tail lamps. They were far away enough to not be disturbed by the usual hubbub of the city, like sirens and screams and occasional laughter in the populated streets. The view was beautiful without the noise.

She watched her date carefully, who was studying the scene before them with an incomprehensible expression, her hands forcefully tucked in her pockets again, because they were still in public, damn it. And she certainly wasn't going to ruin their second-first date by being too forward.

When Lena still said nothing, the urge to explain came surging up her chest.

"I didn't want to repeat our actual first date. Generic dinner and all. It's not much, but I figured it's a fresh start. Full disclosure, though; I didn't pay for the wine. I know the kind of stuff you drink, and I honestly – the price is kind of crazy."

"Kara Danvers, did you steal something?"

"No. Sam gave it to me," she said meekly, tucking her chin.

Lena hummed. Kara was only somewhat relieved at the smile on her lips. The doctor nodded and took off her heels, dangling them on her fingers and making her way towards the blanket. Kara hastily followed, sitting down with one leg crossed and the other stretched out.

She started brandishing items from the basket, including a stereo, a container of potstickers, two servings of avocado and marinated salad sandwich – she had shuddered the moment she spoke those words at Noonan's – and two wine glasses. Carefully, she laid them out on the space between them, presenting as best as she knew how.

And when she was done, she lamely lavished her hands above them with a weak 'ta da' and a nervous tic on her cheek.

She probably shouldn't be nervous. After all, she'd been the one to pursue this and convince Lena to give her a chance. She was sure that they would work out this time around.

Meanwhile, Lena had been the one who resisted and tried to find every excuse on the face of the planet to convince the both of them that it would only lead to a dead end – sometimes, the blonde felt a little guilty for being so persistent, wondering if she had unwittingly hammered away at Lena's walls like a total bull. And yet, here she was, not a hair out of place and didn't seem even a little anxious at all.

"You – you got kale," Lena stuttered in surprise, holding up the package like it was a precious gift or something.

Kara squinted. "You still like kale, right?" she asked hesitantly. Lena chuckled and brushed a hand through her hair, nodding. "Oh, thank god."

"Why do you seem more nervous than I am?"

"Why are you not nervous at all?"

"Oh, trust me, Kara, I'm practically quaking inside," Lena divulged, tilting her head. "Full disclosure, this still doesn't sound like a good idea to me."

Kara raised her brows and leaned back by propping her arm on the blanket. "Why did you say yes to the date then?"

"You won't believe me, but Ruby convinced me." Kara blinked, slightly perturbed by the mention of her niece that she'd met no more than ten times since she joined the family. "I brought her out to a toy store that day, and she chose this…bear. Cute little generic thing with a ribbon and all. She didn't hesitate. She saw the bear and she chose the bear."

Forgive her, but Kara still didn't quite follow the tangent. She squinted more, displaying her confusion.

"So I brought her to ice-cream after –"

"Alex is gonna kill you."

"What she doesn't know won't kill me," Lena dismissed easily with that glint in her eyes that Kara enjoyed so thoroughly. "Anyway, I asked Ruby how she could be so sure about that bear. And she told me that she looked at it and knew that the bear would protect her. That simple." And Lena stopped talking, looking at Kara expectantly.

Believe her, the firefighter tried. She spent the next five minutes trying to figure out the point of the story. How a five-year-old girl and a bear managed to push Lena to agree to a date – not that she wasn't grateful to the girl, and apparently a toy bear, for that, but it still didn't quite make sense.

"Huh?"

"We broke each other's heart," Lena declared, though unlike the previous times she'd brought it up, she seemed at peace with that fact at this moment. "And I've never been able to repair it over the past three years, even though I knew – I know – that you were the reason I was such a mess."

"Seriously, are we still talking about –"

"Hear me out," Lena chastised with an admonishing grin. "We saw each other again, and I couldn't – I realized that I could never fix my heart because I didn't want to. Not that I really couldn't, I just didn't want to." The raven-haired woman picked at the lid of the kale sandwich package and cleared her throat. "Sometimes, things are as simple as they get. And amidst all the complications that have haunted our relationship the moment we saw each other, there is one simple thing."

"Which is?"

"You'll protect me."

Kara's jaw dropped slightly, amazed at how it was all condensed to just this one thing, and it wasn't wrong. Lena wasn't wrong. Kara had always, always, wanted to protect Lena, regardless of whether she succeeded or failed spectacularly at that.

It all boiled down to this one thing, whether they were a couple, or friends, or even two people who used to hate each other while loving one another. Her innate protectiveness, particularly over one Lena Luthor, had been why she always avoided all talk of Lena before they reunited. Because if she heard of Lena, she would want to know more. And before she knew it, she would absolutely end up on a plane just to see for herself.

"I will," she whispered in reply, somehow looking Lena in a whole new light, bypassing all her expectations. "Lena, I swear on my life, I will protect you."

"Even if this fails?"

"All the time, Lena."

"I know."

Kara stammered for a bit, trying to find the words that had disappeared from her vocabulary to express the flurry of emotions. This was probably what all the religious extremists were talking about: seeing the light. Well, they'd never seen the light twice, just like she was now, apparently.

"Is it weird that I kind of want to marry you right now?" Kara asked before she could stop herself.

At that, Lena stiffened. For once throughout this bizarre night, Kara had the opportunity to shock Lena. Though for good or for bad remained to be seen. She fidgeted where she sat, knowing that she couldn't take the words back anyway.

"Why don't we see how this date goes first?"

Kara easily nodded, because from that conversation, a weight had lifted. She was no longer bogged down by doubts of her own – or worse, Lena's – complicated feelings. She was here, always in love with the woman she never thought she'd have a chance with again.

She couldn't ask for anything beyond that at this juncture.

Halfway through the bottle, Kara's blazer over Lena's shoulders, and food all gobbled down, this was turning out to be the perfect date. In Kara's books anyway.

Once they had gotten all the necessary details out of the way, things transitioned into easy conversation, like they tended to be between the two of them. They talked about nothing and everything. From their jobs to the things they'd missed out in the three years they'd been out of each other's lives.

And Kara appreciated every single syllable spoken between them, lapping them up like hot chocolate that soothed even the sorest of throats. And she wondered, once again, how she went so long without Lena by her side.

She wished desperately that she would never have to go through that again, as she lied on her back beside the woman, their hands tentatively touching in the space between them. She was very good at multitasking, so here she was: listening to Lena talk about the latest technique that she'd been looking into, wishing that this night would never end, and finding the will to just catch Lena's hand.

"Can I ask you something?" she queried after Lena had finished talking. Lena hummed in approval. "Can I hold your hand?"

Lena turned her head to face Kara and grinned. Rather than replying, she took the initiative and closed the distance between their hands, interlocking their fingers.

Kara exhaled loudly, her heart thumping violently behind her ribs. She took a risk and lifted their interlocked hands to place a kiss on the back of Lena's hand, long and faithful. She also took the opportunity to breathe in and appreciate the woman's perfume.

"I can't believe I used to wish for you to get out of National City," she murmured, lowering their hands to place on her chest. "I was an idiot."

"Sometimes, I still wish I never came," Lena confessed, allowing her hand to stay on Kara's chest.

"This is good, right?" Kara asked, not just about the hands, but also about the date, their once-again seemingly blossoming relationship, everything.

"This is good," Lena offered, slightly disbelieving.

"You won't leave, right?"

"I won't leave."

"Okay," Kara lamented softly, closing her eyes and nodding to herself. "Okay, good."

Silence hung over them after that. Disturbed by nothing but the beats of Kara's heart ringing in her ears. She was a little overwhelmed by the boundless love that she had rediscovered, hidden away in a corner that she had locked away when she departed Metropolis.

"I'm sorry I didn't fight for you. For us," Kara whispered into the night air. "And thank you for asking Sam to be nice to me."

Lena scoffed, attempting to tug her hand away, but Kara wouldn't let her. "I can't believe she told you." She was quiet again, and then, "I think we needed the divorce." Kara's eyes flew open, and she turned to stare at her ex-wife. "We got married too young, let's be honest. We needed to space to grow without that kind of commitment hanging over our heads."

"Are you saying you regret marrying me?"

"I'm saying I regret that we didn't take time to consider the consequences. Or else we wouldn't be here."

"I hate how you're always right," Kara grumbled, still not releasing Lena's hand.

And then their pagers rang. Literally. At the same time. She groaned aloud and had to let go of Lena's hand for this. She grumbled as she dug for her pager in her pocket, while Lena giggled as she lifted hers from her purse.

"Oh, come on," she complained once she read the code on the pager.

"It's big if I'm getting the code as well," Lena said, sighing and lifting herself to her feet. "Come on, ex-wife, time to go. Lives to save and all."

The blonde never stopped grumbling as she stood up, brushing away at her pants and pouting like a little girl who didn't get her candy. "I just wanted to romance you. Sex you up and all."

At that, Lena burst into bouts of laughter, loud and uncontrolled, just the way Kara liked it. She was holding her stomach with one hand with the other rested on Kara's shoulder to support herself.

At one point, she forgot about the pager and the emergency that called for Station 15's help. She reached out and held onto Lena's waist, pulling her closer and closer as the woman laughed, until Lena sobered up and found their bodies pressed together, faces inches away from each other.

Kara breathed in again, hoping to have that smell ingrained in her head before she would go off to fight a fire for cutting this night short. She leaned in a bit, and their upper lips brushed. She stopped there, not willing to do anything without Lena's explicit approval.

When Lena nodded, she pressed in, almost tipping the two of them by the sheer force of it. Her entire body ignited, not unlike when they'd had sex in the woods a couple of weeks ago, and she could only hold onto Lena tighter so she didn't melt to ground like a useless lesbian.

Lena's lips parted when her tongue swept along her lower lip, gently requestion access. Their mouths slanted together, intimate and warm, and gosh, the fire might as well save itself, because Kara wouldn't it any help given that she was pretty much on fire herself.

Eventually, she pulled back, sucking in air with a foolish grin on her face. Lena was beautiful, and Kara had never hated being a firefighter more in her life.

Chapter Text

"Her chest – it's completely –"

"Page cardio. I'll take over for now."

"Two GSWs to the leg."

"Two missed arteries. That's good enough."

"How is he still alive with a bullet in the head?"

"If you keep talking like that, you can get the hell out of here."

"Dr. Luthor –"

"Bag him. Book an OR. Page ortho."

The second amendment was bullshit. The government was useless. The right-wingers can go fuck themselves and shove a stick up their asses. And shootings kept fucking happening, regardless of whether the victims were having the time of their lives or the supposed lifesavers were on wonderful dates.

And having lost five patients from the 23 who had been brought to their hospital, Lena wondered. She wondered if this was all worth it. She sat on a bench, muted out the cacophony that was still happening, and stared at her hands, still stained with traces of blood that didn't belong to her.

23 victims were sent to this hospital, but there were more. Oh god, there were so many more, transferred to different hospitals in National City, all fighting for their lives. And five of them were already pronounced dead at her very hands. She wondered how many more were lost elsewhere. She wondered if anyone else was in as much despair as she was.

The second amendment was bullshit. The government was useless. The right-wingers can go fuck themselves and shove a stick up their asses. And it seemed like it was all up to people like Lena to make sure as little lives were lost as possible.

She wanted to bury her head in her hands and stop thinking about the faces of the five people she failed to save. But she couldn't, because her hands stank of blood that didn't belong her and goddammit, it wasn't over yet. From what she could surmise earlier, there would be more to come.

"Buck up, Lena. You're not the one with the gunshot wound," she hissed to herself and pushed to her feet, heading back out into the fray to welcome the next victim.

"The second amendment is bullshit," Kara hissed once she dropped from the back of the aid car and wheeled the victim out.

"Yeah," Lena agreed with a whisper, chancing a brief glance at her ex-wife before pushing the victim inside. "Be careful out there."

"You too."

Once the victim was wheeled into the newly vacant trauma bay, she took a good look at his face and could hardly hold herself back from gasping. She looked up to find Alex with the same stricken expression, her eyes wide and her lower lip trembling.

Charlie. The boy who had an anal plug in his ear. A 20-year-old young man who had been perfectly healthy when he was discharged a month ago. Fuck. Charlie.

She pressed her hand harder on the wound, gulping back the bile arising in her stomach. She leaned down, breathing in slight relief when he winced in pain. That was good. Sometimes, pain was good. And in this situation, pain was really good.

"Charlie," she called as loud as she could. "Charlie, can you hear me?" His eyes fluttered, but his hand was weak. "Charlie, squeeze my hand if you can hear me."

On the other side of the bed, Alex was ordering saline bags and trauma kits brought up, along with an ample amount of blood for emergency rescue. All the cardiothoracic surgeons were booked up with operations right now – Charlie's life was truly in their hands.

She could hardly fight back a sob of relief when he squeezed her hand, albeit she could barely feel it. She nodded to herself and stood upright, patting his hand once before letting go and returning to her actual duties. A fucking double-boarded trauma surgeon who was really fucking good at what she was doing.

Lena didn't make any promises, but she would be damned if she let this kid die. She couldn't let this kid die. Not on her watch.

ORs were fully occupied, what with the influx of gunshot victims and collateral damages that rolled in the emergency section's doors like a tsunami. The worst kind of tsunami.

Hence, there really wasn't any other choice but for Lena and Alex to perform surgery on Charlie in the trauma bay. They had had a longer back-and-forth about it than Lena would have liked, weighing the pros and cons of doing it, almost immediately anticipating the disciplinary actions that would drop down on their heads once the higher-ups found out.

But there really wasn't any other choice, so they did it. They had a flimsy little trauma bay turned into a makeshift OR, snapping at any nurse or resident who would dare question them, because now as really not the time. They ignored the cardio surgeon who had yelled at them for being reckless, yelling back at him to just save Charlie's life, damn it.

Dr. Lane was had just extracted the bullet from Charlie' chest cavity when a whole new commotion arose beyond the curtains.

"Where is he?" a male voice bellowed outside. "Where is Charlie?" He didn't sound scared or concerned at all. He sounded furious. "Where is my son, goddammit?"

Lena shared a look with Alex before nodding, indicating that the redhead should stay and assist Dr. Lane. Before the woman could protest, Lena had drawn back the curtain to step out, only to stop short when she was confronted with a middle-aged man holding a submachine gun in his arms.

Rather than the chaos that had occurred earlier, where doctors and nurses were all desperately saving desperate lives, losing all sorts of decorum, the emergency department was strangely calm. Quiet, much like the jinx that all frontliners avoided. Eerily still as everyone stared at the man with a weapon cradled in his arms.

It took her a moment, but she recognized him anyway. Charlie's father, who had a vein throbbing at his temple and white hands clenched tightly around the weapon like it was his true north. It took her a moment, but she realized the reality, a new sense of chills running up her body.

"Mr. Miller –"

"You," he hissed. No, he seethed, eyes wild. "You should have left him for dead last time."

"I save my patients, Mr. Miller. It's an oath I take very seriously," she said, gently but firmly. "Mr. Miller, these people are fighting for their lives here. Please don't do them any more harm than you've already done."

He let out a loud grunt, one telling of frustration and impatience. Then he cocked the gun and pointed the barrel at…her.

Slowly but surely, Lena raised her arms until her palms were level with her chin. Her face exuded an aura of wariness and mirroring frustration. Lives were hanging on the line here; he had no right to barge in here and disturb their job of repairing the damage he had caused. She planted her feet firmly on the linoleum floor and lowered her chin a little.

"He's not – My son has become a sinner!"

"He never became anything, Mr. Miller." She tried her very best to not clench her fists. Or do something like rushing at him in an attempt to disarm the bastard who'd tried to kill his own son. "Your son…is still your son."

"Get out of my way," he seethed, taking two steps closer. A whisper of gasps resounded across the room. "I'm warning you."

"Mr. Miller –"

"I'd be doing this world a favor by wiping his face clean off it."

The gasps repeated themselves. She couldn't help the disgust that flashed across her face. At the audacity of this man. The heartlessness of this monster. What a fucking bastard.

This could be breaking the law. Honestly, she'd never really paid attention to that particular part of med school. But this man was no father. Actually, he was no man. He was just a husk of wrongful thinking and unimaginable cruelty.

"You're not getting to him."

He took one long look at her, left eyelid practically shaking as he observed her. Studied her. Even though Mr. Miller was the one who had the barrel of a dangerous weapon pointed at her chest, the fear that slipped into his eyes was unmistakable. It wasn't much, but there was a trace of her.

Like she was a new kind of beast that would bring the world's demise at their feet. Like she didn't belong here.

"Oh, I see," he said, much calmer than he had been minutes ago. He tightened his grip on the gun and tilted his head slightly, because he didn't really have to aim while they were this close, did they? No, no, he didn't. "You're just like him, aren't you?"

Should she tell him she'd dated men before?

"You're twisted too."

Hell, she'd slept with one or two after her divorce with Kara and not-breakup with Andrea.

"You – you like women."

No, probably not. He'd probably think bisexuality was worse at the rate this was going.

"Why not? They're great. You married one," she quipped before she could stop herself.

Shut up, Lena.

"I won't shoot if you step aside."

"But you will after I do."

"You can't stop me from seeing my son!"

"But I am."

She really wasn't helping herself much right now, but she had sworn to herself that she wouldn't let Charlie die. At least not like this. She had been the one to sit by his bedside and tell him that his parents probably wouldn't be so bad. She had been the one who chose to lie to his parents about why he had become her patient in the first place.

Not like this. Charlie couldn't die without seeing how good his life could be without them. Without this degenerate. She would make sure of it, and she would start by allowing this man not anywhere closer to his son.

Thud.

It was barely audible. Hardly loud. Only one was released, after all. The finger only had to twitch once. In fact, she could scarcely feel it.

But she knew. Somehow, she knew, because she saw the brief flash at the muzzle of the gun. The flicker in his eyes, not one of fear or empathy, but one of pride. Not an iota of shame in his action, it seemed. She was always a better executioner than a talker.

"Lena!"

She lifted her eyes, which had started to darken around the edges, to find a blonde woman absolutely stricken as she sprinted towards Lena. Oh, that was Kara. Oh, no, her legs – the strength was seeping out even without her wanting to.

Okay, maybe the movies were right. Time didn't work that way, but it certainly seemed like it was true when they said that things went in slow motion as you were dying. Feeling each bit of your life slipping away without you being truly aware of it, watching as things went by with a thousand framerates dropped.

As she dropped onto her knees, she could see Kara jumping Mr. Miller from behind, going for the gun first. She reached up one hand to clamp over the hole in her stomach, blinking when her palm came away reddened and soggy. And yet, she could hardly feel a thing.

One of her hand slipped on the floor and she dropped to her back, looking up at the white bulbs that illuminated the hospital. Suddenly, her field of vision was filled with a redhead, holding back her tears as she patted her hands on Lena's cheeks, her mouth forming Lena's name.

Oh for the love of god, she'd only gone on one date with Kara, she thought. And then she didn't think anymore.

"Lena, wake up."

The raven-haired woman grunted, only burying her face deeper into the pillow to shut off the light, somehow. Just a little more. Maybe ten minutes. Maybe 15 minutes. Maybe she could call off med school today. Missing one day of class probably wouldn't hurt.

"Lena, come on."

Her groan was cut off when a pair of lips began scraping up her shoulder. Her very naked shoulder. Being touched by the softest lips that Lena had ever come across. She didn't have to open her eyes to know that Kara had the shittiest smile on her face, a mischievous one that was determined to overthrow Lena's day. With no regrets.

"I promise you'll be glad."

She jerked slightly as cold fingers traveled up her very naked thigh, lifting to the tips once they reached her inner thighs. Endlessly teasing, pronounced only by her partner's deep chuckle, obviously amused.

Groaning again, Lena willed herself to flip onto her back, assisted largely by one strong hand on her hip. And then there was Kara, leaning over her with one arm propped beside her head, the smile on her lips ever so tender, like Lena was the only reason she was happy right now. Lena had never felt as special as when Kara Danvers was looking at her.

"Happy anniversary," Kara whispered and leaned down to press a prolonged kiss on the bridge of her nose.

Ah, right. "Happy anniversary," Lena replied and nosed against the column of the blonde's throat.

Kara lifted her head to look down at Lena once more, her face naturally aglow with the sunlight streaming in the crevices between the blinds. She was beautiful.

"I'm so glad you came to my rescue on that one rainy day."

With a hum, lethargic fingers began their slow crawl up Kara's chest, then her neck, then her face, empowered by the lack of resistance at their pace. In fact, the shudder that Kara heaved once Lena reached a particularly sensitive spot on her collarbone only served to encourage the raven-haired woman more.

How lucky she was. How fortunate. How wonderfully real.

"I think you're the one who saved me that day."

"That's a lie."

Rather than allowing Lena to defend herself, Kara plopped down and buried her face in Lena's neck, whole body and muscle weight bearing down on Lena. It wasn't uncomfortable at all. It was safe, mornings in the arms of the woman she was certain she would love her.

Yes, safe even when the aforementioned woman started blowing raspberries into her neck. She giggled aloud and attempted to push the blonde way. Keyword being attempt, as Kara was a psychopath who visited the gym three times a week and Lena was a normal human being who could barely raise a finger on a cup of coffee.

Eventually, Kara relented and rested her head on Lena's chest, calm and quiet. The birds were chirping outside, as if celebrating their anniversary with them as well.

"What's her blood type?"

"Take mine."

"Kara –"

"We match, damn it! Just take mine!"

Lena, much as she hated to admit it, lived a comfortable life. Exceedingly comfortable.

Her parents footed the bill for her travels in Europe when she took a gap year after boarding school. They paid the tuition fees for med school, only allowing her to take responsibility of other expenses after she pretty much had to beg them to. Hell, she didn't even pay the rent for the studio that Lex had scouted out for her, only one block away from campus.

She was comfortable. The studio space was comfortable. But Kara's apartment was…homely, even as Lena took her first step inside after an invitation for coffee. She closed the umbrella and placed by the door, feeling a little guilty at the dripping raindrops.

This place was lived in. Knick knacks scattered across the common area, like photographs and magnets on the refrigerator in the kitchen. Textbooks of different variety were stacked haphazardly over the coffee table – Lena could spy a couple of medical encyclopedias among them, and wondered if the blonde she'd just rescued from the bus stop was a medical student too.

She stood by the closed door, tilting her head as she studied the puppy figurine staring back at her on top of the television. Who put puppy figurines on their television?

Kara finally emerged from the kitchen, holding two cups of piping hot coffee in her hands and a shy smile on her face. She quietly gestured for Kara to make herself comfortable on the couch and handed one cup over to her.

"Sorry, I'm not sure how you take it. I have sugar and milk if you want some."

"No, it's fine. Black coffee is right up my alley," Lena said, gratefully taking the extended cup and cupping her palms around it to feel only a smidge of warmth. She certainly didn't miss the grimace that passed Kara's face though. "Do you go to med school?"

"Huh?" She turned to the books that Lena motioned at and shook her head with an affectionate chuckle. "Oh no, those are my sister's. She graduated last year, but she left these behind. Probably because I've been drawing on them?"

"You drew on your sister's textbooks?"

Because honestly, it's possible that Lena would strangle Lex if he even drew anything on any of her books. Without regrets. She would laugh at his grave.

"She graduated!" Kara protested weakly. "Anyway, no, I don't go to med school. Not sure I have the brain capacity for it."

"So, journalism?" Lena deduced after having taken a look at the other textbooks strewn over the coffee table, prescribing communications and journalism ethics.

Kara scratched at her brow and cleared her throat. "Yeah, I'm – it's not my major. Not yet. I'm just…trying things out."

She took a sip of her coffee and then blanched, sticking her tongue out as she desperately fanned in its direction, hissing in the process. It was adorable, and Lena had to grin at the sight before her. She leaned back against the couch, finding even this little inanimate object felt homely, like it had been passed down hundreds of generations.

"Thank you for saving me earlier," Kara said once that tongue crisis was over with. "I think I would have been soaked if I'd stayed there until now," she murmured, looking out the window that was dotted with relentless rain.

"Just trying to buy my way into karma's good side."

A bemused chuckle escaped Kara's lips, and Lena briefly asked herself how a chuckle like this could truly exist. A sound like this. She still didn't really know where she got the courage to ask Kara whether she could join her for coffee, but here she was.

Here they were. They didn't know each other. They didn't know they would know each other quite so intimately as they would in the future. But it was raining, and Kara had made her black coffee even though it was obvious that she hated the idea of it, and Lena would love to see more of her.

"For fuck's sake, Lena, you do not get to do this to us. To Kara."

"Dr. Danvers, she's losing more blood than we anticipated."

"Well, then, what the fuck are you waiting for? Get more blood!"

It was near dawn when Lena entered their shared apartment. They had moved in together six months into their relationship, after Kara had decided that journalism wasn't for her. University wasn't for her. And she signed up to train as a firefighter, jumpstarting an array of sleepless nights for Lena whenever the blonde was on duty.

And before they knew it, they had been together for two years already. Lena hadn't really expected this relationship to last this long, though she'd admitted to Sam that she had never felt this way about anyone before. But here they were, and she'd just gotten back from a conference in Seattle and she couldn't wait to be back in bed with her girlfriend.

The absolute love of her life, she was certain now.

Lena had become one of those people who couldn't go more than three days without seeing their girlfriend. Who had to text their girlfriend at least twice a day to feel even just a little bit of calm. Who experienced immense withdrawals just because she didn't get a kiss that day.

It was disgusting. It was something that the Lena Luthor of the boarding school days would have judged her for. It was something that Andrea definitely still teased her about until today. But whatever, the Lena Luthor of the boarding school days and the Andrea of today didn't have Kara Danvers as their girlfriend, so they could suck it.

She didn't even bother washing up. Just hung her coat and jacket on the rack by the door and made her way to the bedroom, her luggage discarded by the couch, waiting to be cleaned up…well, whenever Lena felt like it.

A tired grin spread over her lips when she saw the blonde ball curled on the left side of the bed, one arm protectively hugging Lena's pillow, mouth opened slightly as she quietly snorted away in her sleep. Lena carefully tucked herself into the left side, regaining possession of the pillow and placing her head on Kara's outstretched arm, curling up closer so she could have a close look at her girlfriend's bare face.

Moments later, the blonde started stirring, groaning softly at the disturbance of her sleep, an adorable little frown marring her features. Lena waited patiently as Kara blinked her eyes open, little by little, until her blue eyes were hardly discernible under the sun that was crawling up the horizon.

And there it was, the tender smile that was meant for Lena alone. "Hey," Kara drawled, pulling Lena closer by curling her arm around Lena's shoulders. "I missed you," she murmured against the raven-haired woman's temple. "I missed you so much."

"I missed you too," Lena whispered, not hesitating to wrap her own arms around Kara's waist and pressing their entire bodies together. "God, you have no idea how much."

In a way, she could feel rather than hear the hum that Kara sounded, vibrating only minutely throughout her body and translating it to Lena's skin. Both of them were quiet, so quiet that Lena had thought her girlfriend had gone back to sleep.

She closed her eyes and snuggled deeper into the blonde's arms, ready to fall asleep herself after an inhumanely long day. Only to hear something that would remove all sleepiness all together.

"Marry me."

Her eyes snapped open, but she remained enclosed in Kara's arms, brain wild with all kinds of theories. Well, just one theory actually. Kara was just sleep talking, and this wasn't happening. Not yet. She wasn't prepared. She'd thought about marrying Kara, of course – she loved her – but she hadn't been prepared.

Fuck, go to sleep, Lena. Pretend you didn't hear anything. Pretend you didn't know anything.

"Lena," Kara pronounced softly. Oh shit. "Marry me," she repeated.

Well, okay, no sleep then. She drew herself back from Kara's arms and leaned on one of her elbows as her girlfriend remained on her back, staring at one another as the sun welcomed them to a new day.

Despite the sleepiness and the ruffled appearance, there was no mistaking the seriousness on Kara's face, her fingers fidgeting with the edge of the comforter as they were no longer holding onto Lena. Her eyes were unimaginably blue, pupils dilated, and the adoration basically shone through the blue orbs. And Lena wondered why she ever thought they weren't already at this stage.

"Kara, we're still in school," she said, frowning slightly.

Kara nodded in acceptance and rose to lean on her elbow as well. "I know, I know, but…I love you. And this is – you're pretty much it for me. And I love you. So much," she defended weakly.

And then she leaned over Lena to pull out the drawer of Lena's bedside table, rifling through it before emerging with a velvet box that would fit her palm easily. Lena raised her brows, heaving a disbelieving chuckle.

"You hid it in my table?" Lena pointed out incredulously.

"I figured it's better hidden when it's obvious. Alex taught me that."

"Alex?"

"I've had this ring for a year now," Kara whispered, sheepish.

"A year?"

Kara inclined her head in confirmation and fiddled with the hinge of the box. "I've wanted to marry you since you took care of me while I was sick," she confessed, not daring to meet Lena's eyes. "And I've been thinking, for a year, of how I can propose to you. How to make it special. How to make sure that you know that I love you. But I just – you're perfect, and there's no perfect way to propose to a perfect person."

"Oh, Kara."

"You can – you can totally say no. I won't begrudge you for it. This isn't exactly the best way to propose either, but you were gone for three days, and I missed you like crazy. But I'm still going to love you even if you say no, I promise," Kara rambled off, waving the box in the air aimlessly. "I figured I could, you know, try."

It was perhaps a little mean to be quiet after that, to not say anything. But Lena was – reasonably, she might add – kind of speechless after that short ramble. She took a good look at Kara, trying to locate even a sense of apprehension to be able to say no.

But she couldn't, because Kara was wrong. Lena wasn't the perfect one between the two of them; Kara was. Kara, who had had a ring for a year, and was sincere in her promise that she wouldn't hate Lena if she rejected the proposal. Such an open heart in a human being, and she chose to love Lena, of all the people in the world.

Saying no would be abhorrent. She could only consider herself lucky.

So she leaned in, cupping Kara's cheek in her hand and interlocking their lips together, deep and breathless. Kara moaned into her mouth and kissed her back without hesitation, pushing in until she had Lena on her back. A few moans escaped as they kissed each other, and Kara pushed away, staring down at Lena with confusion.

"Is that – can I take that as a yes?"

"Yes, Kara. It's a yes. Always."

"Asystole!"

"Fuck! Defib now!"

"Yes, Dr. Danvers."

"Lena, you cannot do this to Kara, do you hear me? You cannot do this to us, you fucking asshole. You spent too long running away from us. I'm not letting you do that again. Not like this."

Chapter Text

"Lena!"

"Kara, you have to let us save her."

"Where is that fucking bastard?"

"You need to calm down."

"Calm down?"

"Why don't you go home?"

"No."

"Sam, I –"

"She'll be okay."

"You don't know that."

"We have to believe."

Blood. Blood on her hands. Blood on her bruised and numb hands. Blood that didn't even belong to her. Kara couldn't tell Lena's blood apart from that of the guy she had punched almost half to death before Sam and James pulled her off him.

It was all a blur, but she remembered one thing very clearly – she landed a pronounced kick to his crotch before she was successfully removed from his vicinity, and she wished she had done more than that.

She wished she had arrived faster. She wished she had managed to pull the man away before he pulled the trigger. She wished she hadn't gone away after sending the kid to the hospital, staying by Lena's side like a determined protector. She wished it had all been a horrible nightmare and she was back on the hill with her ex-wife.

Fear was an all-consuming thing, she realized as soon as she saw the blood coloring Lena's scrubs. The gunshot had been quiet amidst the chaos, or maybe she was simply too scared to hear anything but the thud of the bullet and the sight of the raven-haired woman sinking to her knees.

And then fear came over like a blanket all too heavy, enshrouding her like a demon's claws and blinding her to all common senses. Well, fear and anger. And then regret, because the first thing she did wasn't to run to Lena; it was to push the perpetrator to the ground and punching the daylights out of him, as if that would reverse the pull of his finger on the trigger.

By the time she had reached Lena, hands desperate to touch her ex-wife's skin, the woman had been unconscious, blood still oozing out of the wound despite four hands pressing on it – hers and Alex's. By the time she had reached Lena, she didn't get to see Lena's beautiful eyes, and she was afraid that she would never see them again.

What if she never saw those eyes again?

Lena Luthor had beautiful eyes.

She was the most ethereal being on the face of the planet, but Kara was a particular victim of those eyes. She could look into them and lose all sense of self, drown in them and not have a sense of regret. Kara would always strive to keep those eyes as bright as possible; it was a promise she made when they kissed for the first time and Lena's eyes had never been as startling.

"Do you know that your eyes are…different colors?" Kara asked one time, unable to resist as she spent too long getting lost in them.

Lena lifted her gaze from the book she'd been reading, locking them on Kara, and god, Kara was so fortunate to be able to wake up to them. There was a bewildered smile tugging at Lena's lips, and she said, "Are they?"

"Has no one told you?" The blonde shifted closer to Lena on the bed, close enough that she could wrap an arm around the woman's shoulders and pull her closer. "They're like…blue and green," she murmured, tilting Lena's chin up with her thumb. "Especially when you're relaxed, like right now."

"Is it weird?"

Kara shook her head vehemently and let go of Lena's chin, resting their foreheads together. "I could look at you forever."

The raven-haired woman chuckled and placed a bookmark in her book without looking at it. She hummed. "You've already gotten me naked. You don't have to keep flattering me." Kara made a noise of protest, ready to defend her obsession with the woman in her arms. "But I sure hope you do."

"Listen, if there's anyone in this world who deserves to be narcissistic, it's you."

"Oh my god," Lena grumbled and started pushing Kara away, but not very actively, like she was just playing at it. "You're so annoying."

Kara giggled brashly and only tightened her arms around Lena, pushing the woman onto her back so she could hover above, slotting her hips between pale, pale legs. She leaned down and traced a line of kisses across Lena's chest, up her collarbone, nosing at her jaw, and pecking her nose. And then she drew back, finding Lena's eyes dilated and breathing shallow.

Exactly the reaction she was looking for. And damn, her eyes were even more prominent like this. How did she never realize this until today? How did Lena not know she was so besotting? How was any of this possible?

"I love you," she whispered.

Lena froze under her body, but fortunately, she didn't struggle away. She just looked up at Kara, expression a combination of surprise and confusion. Eventually though, they all cleared up, leaving behind intense adoration and expectation.

"I love you too," Lena replied in a whisper.

What if she would never get the chance to say those words to Lena again?

The big day. The biggest day in her life. As if gods above could hear her prayers, the sky was clear and the grass smelled fantastic and everything seemed to be going on track. Caterers all arrived on time to serve food that would match the palates of her and Lena's families. The wedding planner was nice and courteous and never failed to congratulate Kara.

And she couldn't even tie her own tie because her hands were shaking too much from nerves. Trembling, basically, like someone had brought a drill to her hands and decided to vibrate her bones. She hadn't even been this nervous when she asked Lena out the first time. Or propose to her.

She threw her hands down after the sixth attempt of getting the bowtie to behave, halfway to deciding that she would just walk out without the bowtie. Let this be a casual wedding, Jesus. She wasn't going to let a bowtie stop her from doing the one thing she felt like she was born on this earth to do.

"You're not getting cold feet, are you?"

She whirled around, seeing Alex closing the door behind her with a teasing smile on her face. Kara had no idea that she would do the exact thing two years later, but at the moment, she protested, "No! Of course not! I would never." She gestured at the traitor around her neck. "I just can't get this damn thing to work."

"I think Lena will still find you the handsomest person on the planet without the bowtie," Alex joked but approached her sister anyway, batting her hands away so she could help fix it. "It's times like this that you wish dad is still around to teach you, isn't it?" she asked, somberly this time.

"He would have liked her."

"He would have loved her more than the two of us." Kara and Alex shared a smile, simultaneously reminiscent and joyful. Alex then patted the knot of the bowtie and took a step back. "Let's get you married."

Not one of hint of hesitation was detected in her steps as she made her way out of the dressing room to the outdoors, where the wedding planner had it all decorated simply but still important. A signature of an important day between two small people in the whole wide world.

One would even say that they had never seen Kara as excited while she bounded up the aisle to stand by the arch, Ray Palmer standing at the center to be the officiant. She smiled at her close friends and family, winking at Felicity, who had been the one to urge her to just ask Lena to marry her already, for the love of Moses.

And then everyone was seated, and Eliza started playing the piano. And Kara stopped breathing as Lena made her appearance, supported by a healthy Lionel Luthor. Kara stopped breathing and she couldn't believe that this was real, that she was going to keep Lena forever.

"Take care of her," Lionel whispered, patting their clasped hands before sitting next to his wife at the front row.

Kara kept a tight grip on her bride's hand, barely fighting back the tears and the urge to just kiss Lena right there and then. Similarly, Lena's eyes were shimmering with grateful tears, like she couldn't believe this day had come either.

You look so beautiful, she mouthed, not a hint of lie in her sincerity.

Because Lena was so beautiful; Kara had known since the first day she met her under that bus stop awning, rain pouring around them. Only that later, she learned that Lena was not only physically stunning, but also the best person ever. Always kind. Always looking to help. Always ambitious.

And today, she was going to marry this woman. Today, she could really promise, in front of their friends and family and all the people that mattered, that she would be by Lena's side forever. God, she really thought they would be together forever.

What if she lost her chance of making another promise of forever, for real this time?

It was late. A little too late for it to be anything salvageable. Kara grimaced as she stared at the door that would lead to her home, only it hadn't felt like a home for some time.

The apartment felt like a warzone. A place where the two occupants would wage their war of words, throwing scathing remarks and shouting unforgivable comments at one another. There was no longer the peace and warmth she used to associate with it, only a location for her to sleep, if she ever had the time for that.

She shook her head like a dog in an attempt to shake away the tipsiness from the three mugs of beer she'd ingested before she decided it was time to face the music. She sighed and closed her eyes. When did it all go wrong?

As quiet as possible, Kara fished out the keys and unlocked the door, tiptoeing in like a thief, hoping that tonight would be peaceful. That she could sleep for a couple of hours and head out before her wife would realize she was even home. How did it get so wrong?

"Where were you?"

Damn it. Abandoning all efforts to be stealthy, the door clicked shut behind her and she tossed her belongings on the little table next to the walk-in closet, hanging her jacket in the closet and placing her shoes neatly on the rack. It was a lame attempt to prolong the inevitable.

She should have slept at the station.

"Something came up," she muttered, avoiding any eye contact with her wife, who was seated on the couch in the darkness.

"Right," Lena scoffed.

"Look, can we not do this tonight? I'm tired and I smell of cat piss."

When she finally found the courage to look, she found that Lena was holding a tumbler in her hand, a bottle of whiskey three quarters empty. Well, at least she wasn't the only one who had to find solace in alcoholic beverages. But she also knew that a Lena who had drank that much was a brutal Lena, and she didn't want to face that tonight.

"I'm going to bed," she announced, already striding towards the bedroom.

"I went for a walk in the park this afternoon," Lena said, stopping her. "Well, yesterday afternoon, more like." Kara stared at her sideways, wondering what Lena had come up with tonight to insult her. "And I saw this – this couple, a man and a woman, I'm not sure if they're married, but they're a couple." Lena took a sip and winced slightly. "They were laughing, talking about a nephew or something, and they were holding hands, and they seemed happy. So happy," she drifted off, staring at the television. After a long while, she turned to find Kara's eyes. "Do you remember that? Being happy. Just laughing at stupid stuff."

Kara sighed and said, "Lena…"

"They loved each other, no doubt about it."

"Can we wait until the morning, please? I'm tired."

"You're always tired. And I'm always waiting."

Kara scoffed, somewhat awed at her wife's audacity. She turned away from the bedroom and approached the living room, standing behind the armchair and gesturing at the mess of textbooks sprawled over the coffee table.

"You're not exactly a free woman yourself, Lena," she bit out.

"At least I come home," Lena retorted, volume rising with each syllable.

Well, here it went. "I wonder why I don't want to," Kara said, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Lena demanded, jumping to her feet.

"It means you won't get off my back, Lena!" Kara shouted, ready for the next shouting match to come, like an MMA match, only with their mouths. "I have a job and I'm trying to support this household!"

"What? And I don't?"

"You're a damn resident! How much do you fucking make?"

"Right, so it's about money."

Kara squeezed her eyes shut and closed her eyes, regretting her words already. Fuck, she should never have said that. She should have never drunk those three mugs of beer. She should have just come home and sort things out, no matter how much she didn't want to.

"Do you still love me?"

Kara's eyes shot wide open at that. Lena was staring back at her, surprisingly sober despite the whiskey she'd had. There was no mistaking the look on her face; she was expecting the worst answer possible.

And the blonde wanted to mitigate that. She wanted to brush all those worries away and reassure Lena that yes, yes, she still loved her. She would always love her. Except, for some unfathomable reason, she couldn't say it tonight. Something was stopping her and she didn't know what it was. She just couldn't say it.

Then she was speechless for so long that it didn't seem to matter anyway, because the reality of it all sank in and she watched Lena retreating right before her eyes. And it broke her heart, but she still couldn't say anything. She didn't catch her the moment Lena needed it most.

Lena chuckled sardonically and downed the rest of the whiskey before plonking it down on the coffee table. "Well, I guess that settles it then."

"Babe –"

"Do not call me that," Lena hissed, her eyes welling with heartbreaking tears. "You don't get to call me that anymore."

"Lena, please. It's not that."

"Then what the hell is it?" Lena yelled, pretty much pleaded. She ran her fingers through her hair and choked on a sob. "Am I supposed to keep waiting for you? You don't even want to come home anymore. What's the point of this place then? Our bed? It's my bed now. You're just – what the fuck do you want?"

"I want to stop fighting. I want to fix this," Kara whispered, more exhausted than ever.

She had a feeling, earlier today, that this day would be it somehow. That was why she worked herself to the bone at the station and didn't even hesitate to join her colleagues on their bar crawl, because if she came home, she knew it would break. Everything would diminish.

And it was all coming true right before her eyes, and she didn't know how to stop it. How could a person stop an avalanche without killing themselves?

"Do you still love me?" Lena repeated.

Still, still, her traitor of a mouth wouldn't let her say anything in response to that. It was so simple. So easy. But she couldn't. What the hell was wrong with her?

"Then there's nothing to fix," Lena concluded. "We can't fix this."

Oh god, how did she fuck up so bad?

What if she could never fight with Lena again, because Lena wouldn't be there?

The big day. The worst day of her life. As if the gods could hear the anguish roaring in her chest, the sky was gloomy and the rain poured, the earthy scent of grass permeating her nostrils. As if mocking her for her stupidity and carelessness. For allowing it to come to this point.

Kara knew innately the promises she was breaking the moment she agreed to Lena's request. Well, not so much a request, but a tearful demand. A plea to release her from the pain that Kara had put her through, that they'd put each other through. And Kara had always been terrible at saying no to the woman.

The process had been simple and easy, because as much as they said they hated each other through the last few months of their turbulent marriage, Kara still wanted the best for Lena, and she wasn't going to make it difficult. So whatever Lena asked for in the procedure, she only had her lawyer agree.

No point dragging it out.

She stood outside the building in the middle of Metropolis, ignoring the messages that were starting to stack up on her phone. She leaned against, ironically, a bus stop and just looked at her watch, the second hand ticking and ticking and ticking, signaling that time wouldn't stop just because she didn't want to do it.

"Ms. Danvers." Kara looked up from the offending timepiece and saw Laurel standing there, lips pinched. "Shall we?" Laurel asked softly.

The probationary firefighter clenched her jaw, attempting to suppress the sourness in her chest that had lingered and failing. For a second, she wondered if there was any way for her to not go up there and still get it done. Laurel could forge her signature and she wouldn't care.

In the end though, she just nodded and pushed away from the bus stop. They walked in together, silent in her grievance. She kept her eyes ahead, not looking at anyone or anything as they exited the elevator and headed down a corridor and then into an office.

Then she looked at Lena, whose demeanor was cold and expression was, well, expressionless. They locked eyes and Kara stood in the doorway, just staring at her wife. Her wife for another thirty minutes, if things went smoothly.

Who was she kidding? Nothing about this was smooth.

Could she turn back time? She wanted to fix this. Fix everything.

She sat down next to Laurel, opposite Lena and fucking Andrea. God fucking damn it. Of course Andrea would be her lawyer. She could hardly stop herself from leaping across the table and throw Andrea out the window, irrational as it was.

Neither Kara nor Lena spoke a word as Andrea and Laurel laid out all the papers and pointed out the pages they had to put down their names. Only nodding silently to convey their understanding of this final step in the painful procedure. As Andrea spelled out the terms, Kara could only look at Lena, who refused to look at her.

"Do you really want this?" Kara asked, interjecting Andrea's droll.

Lena's eyes snapped up from her hands to her wife of another ten minutes. Her jaw trembled and her cold eyes seemed to warm a little with melancholy. Because Kara didn't want this; despite their fights and door slamming, she didn't want any of this. She was only doing it because Lena asked for it.

After a few long moments, so extended that Kara was actually foolish enough to be a little hopeful, Lena inclined her head and shrugged weakly. "It's the only option," she whispered, her voice hoarse.

Kara let out a sharp breath and felt an irrational anger rise within again. This time, not at Andrea, but the woman before her. Kara made vows, sure, but so did Lena, and it didn't seem like Lena was trying to keep any of them at all.

She nodded ferociously and didn't even allow Andrea to finish her diatribe, instead picking up the pen against Laurel's warning and pulled the papers towards her. She signed her name on all the fucking pages, so strongly that one of the pages kind of tore. But fuck that. Fuck everything.

If Lena wanted her to sign, she would sign. She dropped the pen after signing on the last page and stood up, tucking her fists inside her pockets so she wouldn't end up punching a wall or something. She inhaled shakily and nodded to herself.

"Are we done?" she asked no one in particular, desperate to run out the door. Laurel and Andrea only gaped at her, probably having never seen this before in their careers. She huffed and looked at Lena, who was, finally, crying. "We're done."

It was…done.

Inside, she apologized for being so irrational. So temperamental. She apologized that she didn't end up catching Lena anyway, and walked out of the building and out of Lena's life, thinking they would never see each other.

What if she would never get the chance to fix the whole damn thing?

"Lieutenant Danvers."

Kara looked up to find Lillian Luthor standing before her, looking not regal for once. Her lips were pale and there was a fear in her eyes that was unmistakable, and there was no jewelry adoring her features. Just a mother concerned for a daughter hanging by a thread.

But she was still poised. Back straight and lips pursed, determined to believe that her daughter would pull through even if she had to pull Lena back herself.

"Mrs. Luthor," she breathed, hopping to her feet, hands fidgeting at her belly. "I – I'm so sorry. I couldn't –"

"Stop." Kara stopped and just stared fearfully at her former mother-in-law. "Come. Let's have coffee." Kara's eyes widened. "This is going to be a long night. Let me buy you coffee," Lillian insisted.

Kara looked over the woman's shoulder and saw Lionel and Lex hunched over on the bench on the opposite side of the corridor, looking at nothing in particular. Just afraid. For a brief moment, she wondered who called them and how they got here so fast. She was too busy regretting all the moments that had led up to this moment.

She offered a meek nod and started leading Lillian out the building to the coffee cart that operated at unearthly hours. She numbly watched the Luthor matriarch purchase two cups of piping hot black coffee, not daring to tell Lillian that she hated black coffee and just taking the paper cup as offered. They made themselves comfortable on a bench in the garden, reeling from the tumultuous night that they'd both gone through.

"Can I call you Kara?" Lillian asked.

Kara was taken aback for a moment, because she had never known Lillian to be one to ask for permission. "I – yes, of course."

"I've always liked you, Kara," Lillian offered. Uh, what the hell? "I know you've always thought I don't like you, but I did. I still do, for some reason." Okay, this was getting weird. "I suppose it's because I've always believed that you're the only person capable of loving my daughter the way she deserves."

At that, a wave of shame washed over the blonde's body. She kept her hands cupped around the coffee, allowing the heat to remind her of reality. "Not always," she said, remembering all the moments that she'd hurt Lena. "I failed your daughter when she needed me the most."

"We all fail the people we love. It's the way of life," Lillian easily replied, gazing at the moon.

Kara exhaled shudderingly and followed Lillian's gaze. "I'm sorry I didn't call you."

"I understand. We all do." Lillian combed her fingers through her messy hair. "Can I tell you something, Kara?"

"Of course."

"I am –" Lillian clenched her jaw, and for the first time, her mask of poise cracked, anguish leaking through, however unfathomable it was. "I am scared out of my wits," she confessed with a teary chuckle. "When Samantha called me, my blood ran cold and I couldn't move for a good five seconds. All the nightmares came through my mind."

"Mrs. Luthor –"

"But I pulled through. I woke my husband and son up and I offered to pay the pilot extra to fly us over as soon as we can. I tell myself that I will not show up at my daughter's funeral. She will show up at mine, selfish as that may be."

"It's not selfish, Mrs. Luthor."

"My daughter is the strongest woman I know."

"Yes."

"She will make it."

"Yes."

"You have to believe with me, okay?" Lillian said. No, she pleaded, looking at Kara with the face of a mother, rather than the scary matriarch that had kept the family going. "Lena is going to make it."

Kara nodded, even though she really didn't feel all that confident right now. But tonight, she believed she was seeing Lillian Luthor for the first time, a woman who only wanted what was best for her children.

She would make up for all her mistakes. She would fix her regrets. She would believe if only so that she could laugh with Lena again.

Chapter Text

There was familiarity infused with the smell that invaded her nostrils. She would know – she spent her career inhaling it, almost like a perfume that everyone abhorred. The noise as well, it was known. Rhythmic. If she focused, she still wouldn't understand, because EKGs were fucked up.

But this was all very familiar. And she was, for the lack of better word, comforted by it all. If this was death, then at least she was in a place she knew well, a location she dwelled as her life purpose. If this wasn't death, well, as much as EKGs confused her, the beeping noises only meant that she was alive, despite Mr. Miller's best efforts.

Movies and TV shows often depicted hospitalized people to be very confused individuals, uncertain of what had occurred or where they were the moment they regained consciousness. They were lies, or maybe Lena was just an outlier.

Even before she opened her eyes, she was very aware. She was conscious of everything that had led up to this moment. The act of courage – or perhaps foolishness – that she had pulled to ensure that a boy, who never asked for a monster as a father, was safe. She hoped it didn't all go to waste.

The morphine was working exceptionally well though. No ache or flaring pain in her stomach, which was where she was sure she had been shot at. But experience told her that once it all wore off, once the surgeon had deemed her well enough to not need it, it would all come back to her like a fucking bitch.

It was a blurry patch when she finally opened her eyes, albeit blurry patch of nothing but white ceiling, but she could tell that it was blurry. It took a moment for everything to clear up, only for a redhead to invade her vision, much like a redhead did when she had passed out.

"Oh god, Lena," Alex whispered, one hand brushing her hair tenderly. "Hold on, I'll get the rest. I'll get my mother as well."

Right, her mother – Eliza Danvers – the best general surgeon on this side of the hemisphere, except he didn't work in National City, let alone in this hospital. How did she get here? Why was she even thinking these things? Oh god, will someone take her place as the best neurosurgeon in the country?

"Do not close your eyes, please. Hey, listen to me," Alex urged, still brushing her hair with one hand while the other was holding a phone to her ear. "Lena, hear my voice. Just don't – Kara, Kara, come here right now."

Okay, so the fact that Alex was panicking was just confirmation that she didn't die. Wonderful, though maybe not so wonderful once the morphine wore off and the pain set in. But for now, yeah, wonderful.

That meant that she wouldn't die with just one date with Kara – well, one date after their divorce and an attempt at repairing their relationship. And believe her, after that one bout with the grim reaper, everything was clear to Lena now. Crystal clear.

But for now, though, she was just tired. She had no clue how long she'd been out of it, probably a medical induced coma for a significant while, judging by Alex's reaction. Still, she was so tired. Maybe it was all catching up to her, and regardless of how long she'd been asleep, it apparently wasn't enough.

"No, Lena, no, come on."

Sorry, she managed to mouth, and promptly relented. And before she knew it, the white ceiling was gone and it was all black.

The next time she opened her eyes, it wasn't to white ceiling. It was to – oh – there she was.

Kara Danvers, all blonde and handsome, drabbed in a pale blue hoodie that she had stolen from Lena all those years. In spite of the wooziness in her consciousness, the raven-haired woman couldn't help but grin at the sight in front of her. Or above her. Whatever.

For a moment, Kara was frowning deeply, her cheeks wet and hair clobbered up in a messy bun, seemingly unwashed for a very long time. But then the next, a gentle smile stretched across her lips, all relieved and tranquil, as if this was the moment she'd been waiting for.

"There you are," Kara breathed, reaching out to cup her cheek, and god, it was so warm and homely. "I've been waiting for you."

It took a little longer than she would like, what with the hoarse throat and morphine, but eventually, she managed to say, "The second amendment is bullshit."

Kara heaved a watery chuckle and closed her eyes tightly as she leaned down to place a long, long kiss on Lena's forehead, hand resilient on the fallen doctor's cheek. "God, you scared the shit out of me," she whispered once she'd drawn back and leaned their foreheads together.

Lena hummed in pleasure, nowhere close to rejecting the affection. "Kara Danvers curses now?" she replied in a whisper of her own, even though they were the only people in the room, save for the beeping of the heart monitor she could hardly understand.

"Babe, I'm gonna curse at you so badly once you recover," the blonde promised.

"Water before that, please."

"Oh, right." Kara stood upright and Lena didn't even try to not groan at the loss of their closeness. She watched as her ex-wife poured a glass of water from a jug, placed it on the bedside table, helped Lena sit up, and handed it to her, attentive and gentle throughout. "Why are you the bravest woman I've ever known?"

"It's the Luthor gene," Lena offered once her parched throat was quenched.

"Are you in pain?"

Lena shook her head. "The morphine's doing exceptional."

Kara narrowed her eyes. "You're high, aren't you?"

"A little."

"I'll call Eliza."

Lena nodded, understanding the procedure and making a note to query as to how Eliza ended up here. "Okay," she agreed easily. "I – can you stay though?"

Kara looked down at her after pressing the button above the bedframe, confused for a moment. And then she smiled again, sitting at the edge of the uncomfortable mattress and placing her hand on Lena's cheek again, stroking her neck with her little finger. God, Lena didn't understand how she went three years without this.

"I'm never leaving you."

It sounded like a promise, but Lena didn't want to hope too much. Being too hopeful would only break her heart, she had learned that the hard way.

But this was nice. This little statement, spoken in a quiet room in a building permeating with death and sickness. It wasn't exactly a promise, but given the state she was in, having someone with her – a person she couldn't ever bring herself to stop loving no matter how much she convinced herself otherwise – was better than nothing.

"Your brother cried."

"Excuse me, mother."

"Your father almost had another heart attack."

"I can't believe my wife is a tattletale."

"I bought your ex-wife coffee."

At that, Lena raised her eyebrows, partially amused at her family's antics and mostly curious at her mother's declaration.

Upon seeing her conscious, Kara was finally convinced to at least head home for a couple of hours for a much-needed shower and a short nap – preferably an entire night of sleep if she could manage it. And that left Lena with her family, who had been wise enough to know to return to their hotel every night for the past week and looked decent.

For the first time since her divorce, Lillian took the initiative to wrap Lena in her arms for a prolonged moment; a mother hugging her daughter whom she'd thought was one step into the afterlife, if that even existed. Lena was surprised for a bit, but eventually she learned to accept it.

"You also smoked one pack a day," Lionel admonished.

"And Sam told me she heard you throwing up in the washroom," Lex continued.

"Okay, so you are all tattletales," Lena offered, a weak smirk on her lips.

"It's the Luthor gene," the rest echoed.

They laughed for a little while, finding light in the aftermath of a grim situation. Gradually though, they all sobered up, and fear made its way to her family's eyes, a shadow that seemed to have lingered for the last seven days.

Lillian sat one side of Lena's bed while Lionel sat on the other, and Lex was holding Lena's chart like it was a lifeline, telling him all he needed to know about her condition. Physically, at least. This was a family of medically trained geniuses, and they liked nothing more than facts, and her chart had all the facts.

"I forbid you from being so brave again," Lillian demanded, quiet but stern, as if her words had any effect at this stage of Lena's life. "I want to see you marry Kara again."

Lena blinked rapidly and scoffed. "What on earth –"

"A mother is never blind."

"We – mother."

"Just don't go and jump in front of a gun again, let alone an assault rifle," Lionel interjected, shooting his wife an adoring look before giving Lena an admonishing one. "You are the jewel in my palm, Lena. I cannot afford the loss of you."

"It's like I'm chopped liver," Lex grumbled, his knuckles white from his tight grip on the chart.

"Find me a daughter-in-law as nice as Kara, and then we'll talk."

"Father," Lena complained, leaning her head back and wishing that she was still in a coma.

"My point is that –" Lionel brushed a palm over his bald head with a trembling sigh "– if by doing this, you wanted me to imagine for one minute what life would be like without you, you've succeeded." He looked deep into Lena's eyes, clear but sorrowful. "It would be unbearable."

"Seconded," Lillian offered.

"Thirded," Lex added.

Call it the morphine, call it the post-gunshot clarity, but Lena couldn't help the tears that sprang to hear eyes and trailed down her cheeks.

She had known – always known – that her family loved her, and she loved them, even though they had odd ways of showing it, like tattling on one another and pranking one another at important events and not speaking to each other for months on end and teaching each other to smoke.

The four of them were never overt in showing their affection. It simply wasn't their way nor their upbringing. It wasn't the Luthor way. In fact, Lena had only learned to take initiatives with hugs and kisses when she met a certain blonde who swerved the trajectory of her life, but she loved these people all the same.

This, regrettable as it was, may be one of the few times – if not the first – they were so obvious. So blatant and upfront of how much they cared for her. And she simply didn't know how to take it in without being a blubbering mess. All she could do was incline her head and sob into her mother's shoulder.

As the door opened, Lena expected a lot of people, from Alex to Kara – she was quietly hoping for Kara, but last she heard, the woman was dead asleep and Lena would rather she got the rest she so desperately needed. What she hadn't expected was Eliza Danvers, wearing a white coat and a stethoscope around her neck.

They hardly had the chance to talk earlier when the older woman came in to check on her, what with everyone else scrambling to catch up with her and smother her with their concern, not that she didn't appreciate it. But here they were, former in-laws, alone after such a long time.

"It may be the morphine, but I'm certain that a three-hour interval isn't common for rounds," Lena offered with a careful smile, uncertain of how she should act around this woman.

Eliza chuckled and made her way to sit down on the vacated chair, deliberately ignoring the chart that Lex had finally managed to replace at the foot of her bed. "I didn't come here as a doctor. I'm here as a friend."

"Is that what we are?" Lena asked before she could stop herself.

"I, for one, sure do hope so."

Three years later, Eliza still had that kindness on her aged features, as if she didn't have a bad bone in her body. She had been welcoming when they first met, and she seemed welcoming now. Lena didn't even think that was possible for a human being.

Hell, when she and Kara saw each other again, the tension was strong and they basically sniped at each other without yelling. It took time and a lot more yelling for them to resolve their issues and be where they were now, a precipice of something Lena couldn't predict.

"Did I miss something or have you always been working at this hospital?" Lena asked.

Eliza relaxed in the chair. "Alex called me." Lena tilted her head. "Your surgeon had been Dr. Lord. Alex doesn't trust him, as you know, so she called me. I was here as a consultant at first. A concerned friend, if you must. But then you hemorrhaged on the next day after your emergency surgery, and I came into the scene, because even a surgeon as arrogant as Lord is, he knew when it was out of his expertise."

"And the chief approved it?"

"We're close," Eliza explained with a shrug. "You – you flatlined on my table."

"What?"

The older woman nodded hesitantly and crossed her legs. "It was a lot of blood. You flatlined for like two minutes. And in those two minutes, I –" She cut herself off and looked away from Lena. "I've never seen Kara so scared. And I was scared, because what do I tell my daughter if the woman she loves had died on my table? Will she ever forgive me?"

"Eliza, I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize to me. It was very brave, what you did. And I am very proud of you," Eliza said with a proud smile. "Even though we hadn't seen each other for three years."

Lena wondered what it was like. To have someone you knew on your operating table and be responsible for their life. She had never experienced that before, though she imagined it wouldn't be easy. The weight of that responsibility would probably crush her.

"Did he make it?"

"Who?"

"Charlie," Lena offered.

"He's safe. The police apprehended his father. I think his mother is filing for divorce now."

"Well, then, it's worth it."

A laugh escaped Eliza's throat and she stood up. "Don't be a stranger, Lena Luthor. Not again."

"It was good to see you again," Lena offered sincerely.

"Likewise."

National City General Hospital was a well-established hospital, having stood for only a little less than a century. As well-established as it as, Lena hadn't spent much time exploring the premises, what with being a neurosurgeon and trauma surgeon. Much of her time had been sprinting between both floors and studying up cases and napping in the on-call room.

Now that she wasn't a surgeon but a patient instead, she found herself understanding why patients had always been in such bad mood when they were confined to their wards. It was driving her nuts, just sitting in bed with nothing to do. People had brought books and kept her phone charged, but god, this was the worst, and probably the one thing that convinced her to never get shot again.

When Eliza had finally cleared her, she didn't even hesitate to ask for the wheelchair, as much as she hated it. She was determined to wheel herself to the garden if she had to, but Kara had readily taken up post behind to wheel her out, keeping her word of never leaving Lena.

"My god, fresh air," Lena appreciated once they were out in the garden.

Kara chuckled and placed a hand on Lena's shoulder from behind. "Congratulations, Dr. Luthor. You're, technically, a free woman." They strolled for a few moments before Kara stopped by a bench, sitting down. "You know, I'm supposed to be the one with the dangerous job here," she joked, or at least attempted to, but Lena could spot the vulnerability on her face.

"I'd do it again."

The firefighter sighed and lowered her head, reaching out to clasp Lena's hand on her lap. "I know. I know you would."

"I could do without the getting shot at, but –" Lena paused, vividly remembering the events that had led her to this moment, specifically the vitriol on Mr. Miller's face and the fragility that Charlie didn't deserve. "He's just a boy."

"I know."

Kara leaned forward to rest her forearms on her thighs, holding Lena's hand to her mouth. Not kissing it; more like an act of touch, a desperation for reality, a reminder of where they were now, as compared to where they were a week ago.

She was always one to wear her heart on her sleeves. Lena had simply chosen to ignore the signs a few months ago, pretending that she couldn't see the yearning that was practically etched into the blonde's features whenever they looked at each other. And right now, the lingering fear remained in the hook of her nose and the frown of her lips.

"It'd be hypocritical of me to ask you to never do this again, wouldn't it?" Kara whispered, resting her chin on Lena's knuckles.

"Yes."

"I thought so."

"Do you know what my first thought was when he shot me?" Lena offered, raising her brows. Kara shook her head, prompting her to continue. "I didn't feel any pain – I still don't remember any pain. I felt like I was getting punched, but oddly, no pain. But I – you were there, yelling my name. And I was complaining to myself that I couldn't believe that we only got that one date before I died."

"You didn't die," Kara groaned, emotions rising in her voice.

"Okay, Kara, okay," Lena soothed. "I'm just saying…I couldn't believe we only had that one date." Kara gulped audibly and kissed Lena's knuckles desperately. "I'm sure I'll feel a lot of pain once the morphine wears off."

Already, pins and needles were encroaching upon the bandaged wound and the soreness in her hips was unmistakable. Soon, she would be wishing she never jumped in front of that rifle in the first place.

"I'll be here."

"You can't be here all the time."

"Watch me."

"Kara," Lena pronounced gently. "I won't forgive you if you don't do your part in saving the world."

"I just – I need to look at you," Kara said stubbornly, her eyes blinking rapidly, as if uncertain of how else she could express her apprehension of not being by Lena's side at all times.

But Lena understood. She got it like no one else. She had spent a majority of their relationship being worried about her girlfriend, fearful of the possibility of getting a call that one day, telling her the worst news she could ever hear.

"Alex will be here. Your mother will be here. You trust them, don't you?"

Kara hesitated, but nodded eventually. "Can I just stay with you one more week though? Sam already approved my leave. Let me look at you more. If not for you, then for me. I only want to see your eyes and make myself believe that you're awake."

Well, it wasn't like Lena would ever say no to that. She was a selfish person and she wanted to look at Kara too, despite how much she'd resisted that urge only two weeks ago.

"Okay." Carefully and gingerly, she extended her arm to place her hand at the side of Kara's head, brushing her fingers through golden strands tugged into a half-knot. "I dreamed about us, you know." Kara stared at her curiously. "The day we first met, our first anniversary as a couple, your proposal – I dreamed about it all." She sighed and relaxed in her chair, groaning slightly at the soreness that spread with her movement. "I don't know how I ever thought I could forget you."

Kara's eyes widened. "Lena."

"I can't say it…yet," Lena said with an apologetic grimace.

"That's okay." Kara sat straighter and looked into Lena's eyes. "I'll say it for the both of us. You don't ever have to say it again if you don't want to."

"Really?"

"Really."

"I want to say it though."

A wet chuckle escaped the blonde's throat and she moved to the edge of the bench so their knees would slot together, bringing their foreheads together. "We have all the time in the world, Lena." Oh, those freckles, Lena had forgotten about those freckles. "I'm gonna kiss you now, okay?"

Without even a hint of hesitation, Lena nodded and leaned forward before Kara could, slotting their lips together.

One week ago, it had tasted like coming home, an oh-there-you-are moment. This time, it was less like coming home and more like floating. A sense of clarity that Lena hadn't felt in three years, an oh-this-has-been-it-all-the-while moment. Lena imagined all kisses with Kara would bring with them a realization that she would enjoy, and she couldn't wait.

"I love you," Kara whispered against her lips.

Yeah, this had been it all this while.

Chapter Text

It had been a week since Kara called off work to take care of Lena. To look at Lena more. To make sure that this wasn't all just some sweet nightmare in the aftermath of watching the love of her life being shot in the abdomen and hearing from her own mother that the woman had flatlined twice on the table.

A week was what she was promised, and Kara lapped it up. Kissing Lena with every opportunity she had and holding her hand as she slept. Those things felt solid. Real. Realer than pinching her arm every morning to remind herself that it was, indeed, real.

And a week later, she was back at Station 15, to the joy of her colleagues and the relief of her captain, who had claimed to have been swarmed with paperwork without her lieutenant's trusty assistance. Barely five minutes into her shift, they were called out to a scene, and it put the phrase 'calm before the storm' into perspective.

"Where's the fire?" Kara had to ask, because the storage facility looked…okay.

"In one of the units. It's spread via the vents. Can't see anything in there," one of the cops on the scene replied. "Manager told us there's a guy inside. Homeless. She's been housing him in one of the empty units."

"Empty unit's on fire?"

"No. Those punks –" the cop pointed at three dudes sitting at the aid car, breathing into oxygen masks "– were having band practice. One of them had a cigarette." Well, nothing more had to be said after that.

From there, Sam delegated them to their tasks, separated into three teams. One to look for the homeless guy. One to ventilate the roof. One to put out the fire. Kara was in Team A, because she had always had a knack of looking for people. It was kind of like a superpower.

It all seemed pretty routine in the beginning. Ventilate. Put out. Search and rescue. First aid to anyone who needed it. But the universe seemed to be playing a trick on Kara in this case, because as it turned out, the roof was too unstable, and if they sawed through it, the guys would most likely fall through and they would lose more people than they needed.

"For the love of god, when we said don't put propane tanks, we fucking meant it," James grunted through the walkie-talkie.

The flashlight wasn't much help, because the cops were right. They could hardly see anything in here but smoke and smoke and more smoke. There was definitely something wrong with the building structure and the owner would definitely go under inquiry for not following protocol, but that wasn't the issue here.

The issue here was that they found the homeless guy, thankfully, but they couldn't find their way out. And the smoke was getting heavier. And last Kara checked, her oxygen tank was at a new low. This was not good.

"No pressure or anything, but we could really use the ventilation," Kara urged, keeping the homeless guy under her arm and forcing an oxygen mask on his face as she tried to find her way through this fucking maze.

"Working on it, Danvers," Felicity's voice sounded over the walkie-talkie.

"Work faster," James groaned.

"Is it me, or is this place a maze?" Kara tried to joke, turning a left corner and hoping to all gods that she didn't believe in that this was the right way.

"Should have gotten a map," Nia quipped.

Kara was about to say something back when she ran into something solid. She blinked a few times and drew back, only to have to resist a strained yell when she saw what was in front of her. A solid wall. Dead end. She took the wrong way.

There was a reason she wasn't religious. One of them being that prayers never seemed to work, no matter how hard she tried.

At that moment, her oxygen sensor started beeping frantically. As she looked down at it, she found herself wishing that she hadn't come back into work today, because there it was, she was out of oxygen. Literally. And if she removed the mask, she would be inhaling smoke, which wasn't any better.

No, no, this couldn't be how she went out, she thought as she placed the homeless guy on the floor and holding the mask to his face still. There was no point in moving, because moving would require air, and that was something she was running out of supply of.

No, this was not it. She just got Lena back, who was waiting for her back at the hospital. Her life was starting to look like it was piecing itself back together. She just got Lena back. She refused to go out like this. Not like this, not without kissing Lena and making love with Lena and doing all the things she never got to do with Lena.

"Captain," she murmured into her walkie-talkie, already feeling the wooziness set in.

"Danvers."

"I'm – I'm out," she offered, shaking her head as if it would do anything to take away the dizziness. "I'm lost. I'm out. I can't see anything in here."

"Smoak, what's the status?" Sam yelled through the walkie-talkie.

"Working on it!" Felicity yelled back, her own desperation heard through the coarse communication.

Kara closed her eyes, wanting to fall asleep so bad, but what if she fell asleep and she never woke up again? What if she never saw Lena again? This couldn't be it. She couldn't sleep.

"We're almost through! Just hang in there!" Barry bellowed.

Kara sat next to the guy she had rescued alone and patted his thigh. Not sure what for, maybe as a form of reassurance. She couldn't see anything.

"Danvers, do you copy?" Sam questioned.

Though they were separated by walls, Kara could imagine the look on her sister-in-law's face. Frantic and concerned. Not just because Kara was family, but because she was also a teammate. Station 15 for years. They were as close as firefighters could get.

"I'm gonna go back to Lena, right?" she asked, insecurity and fear staining her voice.

"Yes. Yes, you are, Kara."

"Okay."

Maybe Lena's concern all those years ago was not without merit. Being a firefighter meant risking her life every day. It wasn't a warzone, sure, but their job was war with fire. They fought fire and do the impossible on a daily basis. On any day, they could get cleared out. She could get cleared out, and she would leave a lot of people behind.

But this was her job. And by god, did she love her job.

She loved the gratification that came after saving people and coming out unharmed. The kids that waved at her and told her that she was a hero. The care packages from the people she saved. The camaraderie in the firehouse, a family in and of its own. There was nothing like it. Nothing could compare to it.

Except…Lena. Well, the raven-haired woman had always been an outlier in her path of life, knocking Kara off course every chance she could. And Kara wouldn't regret taking this job even if she died here, other than the fact that she wasted so much time with her ex-wife. God, she should have fought for Lena before they lost so much time.

"Did you know I have a letter in my locker for Lena?" she said, knowing that her life was not in her hands anymore, but her teammates.

"Really?"

"I've had it in my locker for years, even though we weren't together anymore." She wrote it before they got divorced, and logic dictated that she should have burned it once they separated, but she couldn't bring herself to. "Can you make sure she gets it?"

"Kara, you're talking nonsense."

"Sam," she pronounced with a mirthless chuckle, "I'm fighting here. I really am. But just – please, if I really don't make it, make sure she gets it."

The captain was quiet for a long moment, and then she said, "Stop making me do all the hard work, Danvers."

Well, that was as good as a promise, Kara supposed. "She's so beautiful," she lamented.

"It's kind of mean, how beautiful she is."

Kara chuckled, which transitioned into an array of coughs. "It really is," she forced out.

"Stop talking, Kara," Sam instructed gently.

"Okay."

She stopped talking. And waited. And thought about Lena. And saw Lena's face getting blurrier with every second that went by. But she kept thinking about Lena, because if she were to die, she wanted to go with Lena's face in her mind. The most ethereal being on the face of the planet

In her head, Lena's face was blur, but her voice was crystal clear. All her laughs. All her moans. All her giggles. Her words interposed, creating a mirage of music so beautiful that Kara really felt like she was in heaven. A good way to go.

And then the smoke cleared.

"Come here."

Without hesitation, Kara rushed over and knelt by the couch, allowing Lena to hold her face in her hands. Her face had been cleaned of soot and she had spent the last hour simply appreciating clean air in her lungs. Alex had been determined to keep her warded for the rest of the day, but the blonde was having none of it.

She may have only been trapped in that damn storage facility for two hours, but it had felt like forever. An eternity without Lena chastising her for being so damn heroic. And she felt fine. She would be better if she got to see Lena, so she got herself discharged against her sister's wishes and her captain's orders and absconded with Sam's car to see Lena again.

At this rate, she might as well buy the car of the other woman's hands and use it as her must-see-Lena-immediately vehicle.

"Can you quit?"

Kara shook her head and kissed the heel of Lena's palm. "No," she replied assertively.

"I figured," Lena murmured and leaned forward to press her lips against Kara's cheek. "I wouldn't forgive you anyway."

"You're not mad?"

"As you've said, we're older now," Lena whispered with a tender smile and pulled Kara into an embrace.

It was an awkward position, what with Kara kneeling on the carpeted floor and Lena lounging on the couch. Her family seemed to have made themselves discreet in the presence of this display of affection, no doubt having heard of the ordeal Kara had gone through earlier today.

Yes, they were older now, meaning that Lena had finally understood the importance their jobs respectively. Going beyond healing and saving people. It meant taking care of their charges and not giving up, regardless of whatever they were risking. Different professions, but they were both too brave for their own good, and yet, Kara wouldn't give it up for anything else.

Never again.

She heaved a relieved sigh and enclosed her arms around Lena's waist, careful to not jostle her wound. Right now, looking at Lena wasn't enough. She needed to feel her. To inhale her scent. Feel her heart beating against her own chest. Concrete and solid feelings.

"We need a vacation," Lena said into her ear.

Kara chuckled. "I think we'll get fired if we take any more days off."

"It's okay. I have a trust fund."

Fuck, Kara loved Lena so much. Probably more than life itself. And she had never been so glad that she didn't choke on smoke and miss out on the chance of this.

To love and be loved by Lena Luthor in return. It would be an understatement to call it a fortune. It was more than that. Kara thought of it as a blessing. Or maybe a privilege.

She was simply grateful that she ever met Lena at all. Thankful that she got the chance to do this again.

She had wanted to go home after tucking Lena into bed, thinking it unwise to intrude on the Luthors anymore than she already had. But Lionel had shaken his head in obvious disapproval and Lillian had pretty much pushed her back into Lena's bedroom, a glare on her face that could well rival her daughter's.

So here she was, back in Lena's bed. It was well past midnight, and Kara should be more exhausted than she had ever been after everything that had gone down earlier. However, sleep eluded her like Lena had for the past three years. She couldn't close her eyes, because she couldn't stop looking at her ex-wife, who looked peaceful and dreamless in her slumber.

Sam was right. It was almost downright mean, how beautiful Lena was and how unaware she was of her effects on people. And Kara was the luckiest woman in the world to be able to enjoy this beauty so intimately.

"You're being creepy," Lena murmured, burying her head deeper into the pillow.

Kara blinked, not having realized that Lena had awakened. She shifted closer to the woman and draped an arm over her hip. "I'm in love," she justified weakly. "There's this woman. Dark hair. Green and blue eyes. So attractive."

Lena hummed, still not opening her eyes, but there was no mistaking the small smile tugging at her lips. "Sounds like any other woman."

"That's where you're wrong," Kara replied, unable to help the determination in her voice. "More than just any other woman, she is."

"Now you sound like Yoda."

"She's the most captivating woman I've ever met," Kara pushed on, ignoring Lena's jab. "We were so in love once. But I was stupid, you know. I didn't know how to appreciate her as she deserved, and she slipped through my fingers before I could hold onto her." Lena's eyes slowly drifted open. "I convinced myself that I didn't love her anymore. For three years, I drifted, pushing this woman to the back of my mind and telling myself that she's gone. I'll have to be alone for the rest of my life."

"Kara –"

"Then she came back into my life, so resentful and angry at me. She was right."

"I wasn't resentful," Lena protested weakly, holding onto Kara's hand on her hip. "I just had a lot to tell you. Things I never got the chance to before you moved away."

"But she still captivated me, beautiful even in her anger." Kara turned her hand upside down to tangle their fingers together. "And then you know, the most magical thing happened. She forgave me and was willing to give me another chance. And I realized I never fell out of love with her in the first place."

At this point, any traces of sleep were gone as Lena stared at her wide-eyed, reflecting adoration in her eyes. Lena let go of Kara's hand and reached up to cup her cheek, stroking stray blonde hairs with her thumb. Kara would move heaven and earth to feel this touch for the rest of her life.

"You know, I don't think I ever fell out of love with you either," Lena whispered, quiet in the night, other occupants deeply asleep in the other rooms. "I'm pretty sure this is entrapment."

Kara groaned in complaint and turned her head to bury her face in Lena's comfy pillow. "Why do you always ruin the romantic moments?" she grumbled, her voice muffled by the furniture. Lena giggled and pulled her in so they could embrace on the bed. "You're so mean." Despite saying that, Kara still tucked her head under Lena's chin and nuzzled her neck.

"I need to keep you on your toes."

"Yeah, well, just be careful, because I'm never letting you go again."

"Even if I still can't say the words back?" Lena asked, and Kara could hear the insecurity back in her voice, rumbling prominently in her throat.

Well, this would not do. Hence, Kara made a sacrifice and pulled away from Lena's neck, promptly pushing the raven-haired woman on her back, carefully and gently, because the woman still had an injury and had recently only been discharged with a gunshot wound. Kara made a vow to always be gentle with her, refusing to repeat the mistakes she did three years ago.

Kara looked down at Lena, illuminated by barely-there moonlight and nothing else. The last time they had been in the dark like this, Kara had proposed. She would be lying if she said she hadn't thought about shopping for a ring again, but they were taking things slow, and the blonde didn't want to rush into things they weren't ready for yet.

But she knew though. She knew that, one day, maybe in the near future or maybe years later, she would be popping out a ring and propose to the same woman again. A do-over, except this time, no more letting her go. No more abandoning Lena alone late into the night without any explanation. No more running away from arguments just because she didn't feel like it. None of that nonsense.

"I can wait," she promised.

Lena raised a brow. "You are, patently, the most impatient person I know."

"Okay, well, that's just not true," Kara protested with a frown.

"How many times have you burned your tongue because you couldn't wait for potstickers to cool down?"

"They're potstickers! One does not wait for potstickers."

"You're infuriating."

"But you're gonna keep me?"

Lena sighed and nodded. "Entrapment," she reminded.

"Fine, I'm a criminal. So be it." She reached up, one arm supporting her by propping next to Lena's head. "I'm gonna sex you up so bad when you recover."

Lena chuckled. "It's such a waste that you didn't follow the journalism path."

"I'm a criminal and a romantic." Kara exhaled slowly and watched the way Lena's brows fluttered at feeling the air against her skin. "I mean it, by the way. I can wait. We have the rest of our lives."

"So confident."

"I'm a criminal and a romantic."

"Wouldn't have you any other way," Lena promised.

"I have a letter, you know."

"Huh?"

"A letter for you, if something ever happens to me on the job."

They were in the park, taking a walk, returning to their habit. It had been a couple of months since Lena's discharge, and she had returned to work, though there were times when she would still the need the clutches if the injury flared up. The gunshot wound would always be a reminder of how Kara had almost lost Lena.

On the first day Lena had returned to her duties, Kara had shown up at the hospital after her shift was over and Lena's was coincidentally over too. And without saying much else, the blonde had invited her girlfriend – god, Lena was her girlfriend now – to a walk in the park, to which Lena had been startled for a moment before agreeing with an easy smile.

Since then, they walked in the park every day, no matter what time it was. The two of them would talk about their day and the most mundane things. Occasionally, Kara would go back to Lena's place and order takeout, sleeping over only if Lena invited her.

Things were good, but they were only months into the rekindling of their relationship. Kara didn't wanna risk it by being too fast again. She couldn't bear it if anything went downhill.

"Oh," Lena breathed.

"I wrote it four years ago, when I finally passed the test and was officially a firefighter."

Lena halted in her tracks, taking her hands out of her coat pockets and staring at her girlfriend with her mouth opened. "And you kept it?"

Kara shrugged, worrying her lower lip. "I guess I was always hoping that we'd find our way back to each other."

"Oh, darling." Lena approached Kara and placed her hands on the blonde's shoulders. "You're such a romantic," she complained, eyes tearing up. "But I hope I never have to read that letter."

"So do I," Kara whispered.

They had come such a long way in their relationship. And Kara wanted more. More dates. More kisses. More everything. She wanted the whole package.

And last week, against her own instincts, she had dragged Sam to Lena's favorite jewelry store at the nearby mall. She wouldn't propose so fast, of course, but she wanted to be prepared for the moment she felt that they were both ready for the next step. So right now, there was a velvet box hidden under her bed, along with their old wedding album, just waiting to be taken out at the right moment.

And here in this moment, she wanted Lena to know that she was keeping to her promise. She would catch Lena. Maybe starting with the letter wasn't the best idea, but it was the only way she could think of to make sure Lena understood the depth of her love.

"I love you."

Kara blinked. And blinked again. "Say that again?" she whispered, hopeful.

Lena's hands drifted to her face, brushing gently under her eyes. "I love you, Kara Danvers."

The blonde made a noise, like she had been holding it in for eons, just waiting. Look, she knew she promised Lena that she would wait, but this was – god, it was gratifying and made everything so much easier. She made that noise again and leaned forward to rest their foreheads together.

"I love you too," she declared. "God, I've missed you so much."

Lena wrapped her arms around Kara's shoulders. "It's okay. We're here now. We're finally here."

If Kara said anything else, she would break down crying, and that would be weird to do in public. Kara would like to keep her dignity still, thank you very much. So she just pulled Lena in and buried her face in the woman's coat.

Yeah, they were finally here.

Dear Lena,

If you're reading this letter, then that means I'm gone.

And I hope – to the best of my ability – that you'll never have to read it.

Did you know my mother and father never loved one another? She loved our butler, and I used to think it was the purest thing in the world, even though it was adultery and they could never be public. They never got the chance, I suppose.

I used to think it was the purest thing in the world, until I met you. You came to me at the bus stop, and I thought…you're the most ethereal being in the world. My hero, who saved me from the rain and gave me so much more.

That's what she used to tell me, you know. That I'd know who's the one for me when I think they're the 'most ethereal being in the world'.

And I'm sure that when you're reading this letter, we would have so many arguments. But I'm also sure that we're going to be still madly in love with each other. Or at least, I will be. I don't know what I'd do if you don't love me anymore, but that's a story for another day.

I have this favorite thing. My favorite thing is to watch you in the kitchen, singing to the latest Taylor Swift jam. Off-key. And dancing. Kind of clumsily. Because no one get to see that. You, in all your messy and clumsy glory. The real Lena Luthor.

You are my favorite thing in the world. My saving grace. Best of women, best of wives.

This letter is a mess. But my love for you is messy anyway, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

I am sorry that I can't be with you like I promised. But no matter what, I want you to know this: I love you.

I love you so much, Lena Luthor.

Forever yours,
Kara

Chapter Text

"Is it u-hauling if you marry a woman you divorced?"

"You've been back together for six months."

"Hence why I'm asking."

"Lena, it's fuck o'clock in the morning. We finished a 36-hour-shift. I want to go home to my wife and kid."

"Well, is it?"

Alex rolled her eyes and turned her back to Lena, stalling the conversation by checking her teeth in the mirror and brushing lint from her shirt and pulling on her jacket. Lena had had this thought for two months, since that moment when Kara had told her that chicks dug scars and they didn't have to have sex if Lena wasn't ready to.

They still hadn't had sex, even though they had been dating for six months. Lena wanted to. So much. But every day, she would slide out of bed and kiss Kara on the forehead before locking herself in the bathroom. Every day, she would shower and avoid touching the scar that had almost taken her life. Every day, she would stand in front of the mirror and stare at it, cursing Russell Miller.

She wanted to kiss Kara and let the blonde drag her into a bedroom or a bathroom. She wanted to let Kara do unspeakable things to her and vice versa. She wanted to close her eyes and go to sleep without seeing the shadow of Russell Miller's face hovering in the corner.

Kara had been inexplicably patient. Only smiling and nodding and telling Lena that she would wait forever if she had to. She would kiss Lena's scar over her clothes and tell her that chicks dug scars, but then she would turn off the light and pulled Lena into her arms, fully clothed and seemingly content.

And Lena thought of marriage. Again. With the same woman whom she never thought would love her again. She had been thinking about this for two months. She could wait a little longer.

"You're buying breakfast. You're telling Sam why her lovely and patient wife can't make it home as early as expected. You're gonna abstain from buying my daughter any more ice-cream for the next two weeks," Alex demanded as she spun around, though without a fond but slightly annoyed glint in her eyes.

"Deal. Deal. No deal."

"You spoil her too much," Alex grumbled as they made their way out of the hospital, stale with medicine and death.

"I spoil her a moderate amount. I'm her godmother," Lena defended as she shot a quick text to her best friend and muted the chat because she didn't need Sam bugging her about hogging her wife.

They entered a café two blocks away from their workplace, where the pastries were heavenly but the coffee sucked. But Lena and Alex were two doctors entirely too exhausted from a long shift to care about the coffee, ordering warm milk instead for a warm sleep ahead.

"Can you not propose for like another six months?" Alex asked after everything was laid out on the table.

"Excuse me?"

"What? I have a lot of money riding on this, and I refuse to let Lucy win."

"You have a problem." Alex chuckled and shrugged. "So, it's not u-hauling?"

"Oh, it definitely is."

Lena huffed and glared at her former sister-in-law who, thus far, had not been helpful at all. She sipped on the warm milk and wished that she had gone home instead, where her mother still lingered because she worried and Kara would show up later to tuck her in.

But the question had been lingering in her mind for far too long, in her opinion. And she needed an external view, except Sam was far too rational a person to properly answer Lena's question. She couldn't very well ask Kara, so Alex was it – impulsive and temperamental Alex.

"Look," Alex said, propping her elbows on the table. "I love you. You are an awesome human being and I've always rooted for you. I read your papers, you know. And heard about your achievements in Metropolis, and I was always proud, even though you did block us and pretended we didn't exist for like three whole fucking years."

"I'm allowed to make bad decisions!"

"Uh huh, sure."

Lena rolled her eyes, hoping that Alex would just let it go already. "You were saying?"

"Believe it or not, I've always rooted for you and Kara though, despite the fact that it didn't seem like there was any chance of that at all. You, Lena Luthor, are always who I wanted my baby sister to be happily ever after with."

"Even after I asked for a divorce and broke your sister's heart?"

"I love her but I'm not totally biased, you bitch," Alex snapped, rolling her eyes and tearing a piece of croissant to shove into her mouth. "Sam and I were there when it all went down, and we understood that it was an incredibly complicated situation."

"You're still not answering my question."

"It is u-hauling," Alex said, raising her brows.

Lena sighed and shrugged. She figured anyway.

"But it's okay, you know." Lena looked up from her cup to find Alex staring at her fondly, bemused. "You and Kara have defied almost every single romantic stereotype I know of. What's wrong with going along with one, for once?"

Well, she supposed Alex wasn't wrong. She and Kara had gotten married so young, before they even got started on their careers. And then they got divorced. And then they saw each other again, and by some power of nature or something, they managed to fall back in love.

Or maybe they never did fall out of love.

And now they were a divorced couple who were dating again, with a niece they adored with their whole hearts. Even Lena had to admit that it was all incredibly bizarre.

"You give weird advice," she remarked.

"I mean, that's why you came to me, right? And you know, hurt her and I'll kill you, you know how it works."

Lena laughed, finding it ironic – the difference between the shovel talks. But somehow, throughout this conversation that had nothing to do with the shooting at all, Lena came to another realization. Not that she didn't want to marry Kara, because it was only affirmed through Alex's reassurance, but there was something else that she needed to deal with, if she wanted to get rid of the shadow.

A few calls were made. Lionel used his connections to fast track the process. Lillian was highly disapproving of her decision. Lex was hesitant, but he squeezed his sister's hand anyway and asked her to do what she thought needed to be done. Kara was in the dark throughout it all, until the day that it happened.

"No."

"Kara, I need to do this."

"You're not going anywhere near him," Kara hissed through her teeth, reasonably unhappy at Lena springing this on her without any warning. "This is ridiculous. He could hurt you!"

"He's behind bars," Lena remarked patiently, sitting away from Kara because the blonde had deliberately put distance between them in the car once she realized what Lena was doing. "He can't do anything else to me."

"You don't know that."

Lena had known that her ex-wife – girlfriend – would react this way, which was why she had kept it from her until the very last moment. And despite Kara's overreaction to it, Lena understood why, because just the night before, she had specifically asked for a couple of days off and spent an hour shaking in the kitchen.

Everyone had told her the state Kara was in when she witnessed the whole thing – Lena trying to placate a murderer only to get a bullet in her stomach for it. Eliza very carefully drew all the procedures that she had to pull to make sure Lena didn't die on her table. Lillian described the exact state Kara was in before she bought her coffee.

Lena didn't see it, but she could picture Kara's devastation at the idea of losing Lena before they had a chance to restart anything. The woman sitting next to her was simply a woman who truly cherished Lena, and how could she ever fault Kara for that?

"This is – I need to do this," she stammered.

"Why?" Kara asked emphatically, her hands swinging in the air like she didn't know where to put them. "He tried to kill you."

Lena took a deep breath and leaned her head against the headrest of the seat, breath stuttering as the prison building came into view. "Because I want to marry you," she whispered, not caring that the driver her parents had specifically hired for this trip could hear her.

Next to her, Kara inhaled sharply, but Lena didn't look – all her bravery had been invested in this trip; she didn't have any to spare for her girlfriend. "What?"

"It's crazy, isn't it?" Lena scoffed, rolling her eyes at herself and playing with the hem of her coat. "Marrying you should be the last thing on my mind right now. We just got back together. And – and I probably should even be crazy afraid of the concept, after the experience we've had. But – well, I'm not saying we have to get married now. Maybe next year or – or a couple –"

She stopped when Kara's hand appeared in her vision, cupping her tightly clenched hands. Her breath stuttered again, though not because the driver had pulled up the prison and was just waiting for them to get out.

Closing her eyes, Alex's words flitted through her mind. All joking but also all too serious. Sound but weird advice ringing in her ears.

"Someday, I think I want to marry you…again," she said softly, eyes still closed. "And I can't do that if I'm still having nightmares or won't even let you look at me like a lover should." Even now, Russell Miller hovered like a haunting, though he was very much alive, despite the lawyers' best efforts to have him on death penalty.

Silence fell like a blanket. Not warm though. It was kind of suffocating, to be honest, as she waited and waited and waited. Logically, only minutes should have spanned within the blanket, but it sort of felt like eons.

Did she ruin them? Again? Only barely beginning, and she was already shooting her mouth off and scaring Kara away. Fuck.

"Are you sure this will help?" Kara asked gently.

Lena opened her eyes and turned towards the blonde, finding a look of empathy and adoration on her face. Maybe a hint of surprise still. "Do you know what I see whenever I close my eyes?" Kara clenched her jaw. "I see him. Just standing there, waiting to take me. I get nightmares. Sometimes, you're the one he shoots. They wiped my blood clean off the floor of the ER, but I can still see the pool sometimes, just mocking me." She cleared her throat and sat straighter, blinking away the burn in her eyes. "I have to try, right?"

They gazed at one another for a prolonged moment before Kara sighed and nodded, squeezing her hands and letting go. "Let's go then," she whispered.

She opened the door and rushed to Lena's side, opening the door for her and prompted her out, tender as always. Lena didn't know what this meant – whether Kara was brushing her confession aside or if this was her final show of support before she left – but she held on to Kara's hand anyway, clenching tightly.

They went through the visitation procedure. Filling out the necessary forms. Discarding anything that could be seen as a weapon. Received odd looks from the officer guiding them through the maze of hallways. And then they stood outside a room, where Russell Miller was waiting.

"I'll go in with you if you want me to, but I can't promise I won't clock him in the face the moment I see him," Kara tried with momentary levity, smiling slightly when Lena huffed a soft chuckle.

"No, I think this is something I need to do on my own," Lena replied, trembling at the idea. "Thank you for offering, though."

Kara nodded, concern painted all over her features. "When we're done here, you're seeing a therapist. I can call James' sister for you, if you want, but you're seeing a therapist," Kara insisted, and Lena nodded in agreement. "Call for me whenever you want. I'll come. I'll punch the officer if I have to."

"I'd rather you not go to jail as well."

"I'd go to hell for you." Lena's eyes widened, raising her head to lock on to her girlfriend. "For the record, I want to marry you too. Again." The air in Lena's chest released in a second, relief flooding her body. "It doesn't have to be immediately, but I'd marry you tomorrow if you want to."

"We agreed to take things slow."

"We did, which is why I didn't buy a ring the moment you woke up from that coma."

The raven-haired woman had to chuckled at that. She shook her head and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "God, I love you," she breathed.

"I love you too. I'm also serious about the therapist."

"I know."

"Good."

"Can you – can you hold me?" Lena whispered shakily.

Without a word, Kara enclosed her arms around Lena's waist and pulled her forwards, slotting all their crevices together that no space was visible between their bodies. For the next few minutes, Lena buried her face in Kara's shoulder and just breathed.

In a couple of minutes, she would be meeting the man who had pointed a gun at her and pulled the trigger, the reason for all her unreasonable insecurities and the catalyst of all her nightmares. She didn't care whether the guard was impatient or she was missing her appointment time. Kara was holding her, and she just needed the peace.

Gaunt face and lifeless eyes stared back at her. The cruelty remained though, in the strain of his lips and the scar on his face. There were traces of hatred in the flecks of his eyes, completely unforgiving and utterly irredeemable.

Yeah, this was a man that Kara would punch the daylights of without hesitation.

Lena tried her hardest to compose herself and not show her fear or nerves, but she was certain that her eyes couldn't hide a lot – Kara and Sam had always told her that they could see a lot through those traitorous things. Still, she sat in front of Russell Miller and breathed as steadily as possible.

In her head were reminders that this man was unarmed and harmless. That Kara was standing right outside the door, prepared to barge in anytime Lena called out her name. That she survived.

"I married a woman when I was 20," she confessed. His hands tightened on the table, chained and immovable. "We got divorced when I was 21." His hands loosened, but only slightly. "I'm seeing her again now."

He didn't say a word for the next – well, Lena wasn't exactly looking at her watch, busy keeping herself calm in front of the man. "I am not sorry," he finally seethed, jaw clenched and features so angry.

She nodded, since she didn't expect him to be sorry for what he did anyway. People like him couldn't be rehabilitated with something like a prison. People like him would never be sorry for trying to kill their kid or the person who was trying to save his life. People like him would always rot in the depths of their hatred.

"Did you feel anything at all? When you shot your son," she clarified.

"He's not my son."

Well, that was telling enough, if anything. She shook her head and wondered if it was worth it, coming here in the first place.

Lena took a good look at him, taking him the hollowness in his cheeks and the scar that crossed his left eyebrow that wasn't there the last time she saw him. She studied his hands and noticed bruises and burn marks – cigarette stubs, she deduced.

This was an unrepentant murderer. Too far in his righteous religious views to see anything else. Lena would always be a person that he would want to rid this earth of, even though he failed quite spectacularly at it. For a brief moment, she wondered if other victims had come to see him.

Russell Miller wasn't an individual worthy enough for her to be so fucked up over.

"I forgive you."

His eyes widened at her words, clearly not expecting it. And surprisingly, she found herself meaning it. Russell may have shot her and almost took her life, but currently, she was the one who was happy with a woman who loved her more than anything, while he was a divorcee almost constantly abused in the prison.

She wasn't saying it was a fair system, but he had nothing else to live for, what with two consecutive life sentences in his near future. Meanwhile, her mother had become more loving after the incident and her ex-wife was back at her side.

"Honestly, I didn't really know what I was looking when I requested to meet you, only that I needed to see you," she said with a self-deprecating chuckle. "But I suppose now I know." She took a deep breath, took a last look at him, and stood up. "I forgive you, Mr. Miller, and from the bottom of my heart, I wish you will find it in yourself to forgive people like me. Not that I need your forgiveness," she added blithely.

Speechlessness followed, and Lena walked out, having spent barely 15 minutes in the room. But as she stepped out of the room, she could feel the weight bearing down on her shoulders lightening gradually, until it was hardly a weight that she was aware of.

Just as soon as she closed the door behind her, Kara was in front of her, all concerned and slightly pissed off, as if she was ready to stomp inside to really clock out Russell if she was given permission. Instead of doing that though, she merely waited as Lena stood stock still, breathing calmly as she stared at Kara's stomach, focusing on the patterns of her zipped-up jacket.

And in the next moment, she all but fell back into Kara's arm, allowing the tension and anxiety that had pent up over the last six months to pour out in hideous sobs and sniffles. Kara did nothing else but wrap her own arms around Lena's fragile body, ready to steer her away whenever needed.

Sam [3:21 p.m.]: ARE YOU KIDDING ME
Sam [3:21 p.m.]: WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME I COULD HAVE BEEN THERE FOR YOU
Sam [3:22 p.m.]: for someone so smart you're literally the dumbest person i've ever met
Sam [3:22 p.m.]: i love you and you better call me when you're done I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD LENA LUTHOR

Lena [3:43 p.m.]: I'm alive

Sam [3:45 p.m.]: call me, woman

Lena [3:46 p.m.]: Not if you don't calm down

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena requested that they went to the blonde's favorite Chinese place for dim sum and potstickers.

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena asked to go to Kara's apartment, instead of her own place.

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena pushed her onto her back on her couch and climbed on her lap.

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena pulled off her blouse and sucked on her neck.

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena let herself be carried to the bed, bare naked and trembling at the thought of Kara seeing her scar.

"Are you sure?" Kara asked as Lena guided her hand to the apex of her legs, prompting her fingers to just enter.

"I'm sure," Lena repeated like a mantra, coming to life under Kara's touches and no longer seeing Russell Miller at the edge of her vision. "I'm sure."

There was sex, and then there was making love. The former being just that, a vent and a release. The latter being silent fireworks and pumping music in her veins, igniting her soul and lifting her inner senses like a sleeping volcano.

Kara kissed her scar and she felt the guilt wash away all at once, fully getting that Kara would love her no matter what. Impulse took over and she cupped Kara's cheeks, gently pulling her up her body so they could kiss like a couple aroused and in love. Lena could go all night long, but for now, she just wanted the quiet moments in between.

"I love you," the blonde whispered, hands clutching Lena's hips like a lifeline as her lips traced softly over Lena's skin. "I love you."

Lena hummed and wrapped her arms around her girlfriend's shoulders. "I love you too," she replied in kind. "I'm sorry for making you wait so long."

Kara made a noise of protest. She shook her head, going on to lay her head in the crux of Lena's necklines, inhaling deeply. "I would have waited forever," she said. "As long as you let me stay by your side."

Their skins were sticky. The room was humid, what with them forgetting to open the window or turn on the air conditioner as they were both too busy devouring each other like hyenas in heat. The silence was broken by their heavy breathing and syncing heartbeats, beating against each other's chest.

Lena found that she didn't care.

Kara was on top of her in all her glorious nudity. Lena would die happily like this. She hummed when one of Kara's hands sneak up to brush over the scar on her abdomen, tender and studious in the fingers' ministrations. Lena tightened her legs around Kara's hips and just breathed.

"We should probably talk about the thing I said just now," she said quietly. Kara hummed questioningly. "I meant it, you know. About wanting to marry you," she added, finding bravery within her after what they'd done earlier.

The blonde was still in her arms for a few minutes before she raised herself up on her forearms, hovering over Lena. "So did I," Kara responded just as quietly. "Tomorrow, if you want."

Lena chuckled and ran her fingers through Kara's sweat-slicked golden strands. "We'll take it slow though."

"Whatever you want."

"What do you want?" Lena had to ask, because she realized that in the entirety of their renewed friendship and then relationship, Kara had been following her steps, letting her make the decisions, which she truly loved, but at some point, there had to be a line.

"I want you," Kara said easily, smiling contently. "That's all I want. Just you."

Two years down the line, Lena bought a ring from her mother's favorite jewelry shop. Not an overly complicated one that would outshine the sun, but a simple ring – white and rhodium plated at the sides, with their names engraved on the inside.

Sam had told her – accidentally, while they were well on their way to drunk, as Kara and Alex were having their own sister night, and Nia was babysitting Ruby – that Kara had bought her ring five months earlier. She told Lena that Kara was planning to propose during New Year.

Well, not if Lena had anything to say about it.

Kara had always been the first in everything: saying the three magical words, asking Lena on a date, proposing to Lena, requesting that they get back together.

It was time for Lena to be the first.

She kept the ring in Sam's sock drawer, reducing the chances of Kara finding it. She would propose earlier than that. She would propose tomorrow, if she could ever the find the courage.

But she knew one thing, Lena just wanted to Kara to understand that she was loved and wanted as well, just as she had shown Lena all the love and want through the years.

And this time, Lena would keep Kara. She would keep Kara and be sure to love her for the magnificent woman that she was.