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we’ll stagger home after midnight
sleep arm and arm in the stairwell
we’ll fall apart on the weekends
these nights go on and on and on
From an outside perspective, Catra and Glimmer should have been an unlikely duo. They both were stubborn and strong-willed, and unyielding in a way that Adora and Bow weren’t sure if they respected or feared.
Despite the way they should have clashed, they worked surprisingly well together. Especially when it came to throwing parties.
Everything was planned to perfection for the New Years party they were throwing that weekend: plenty of food, fireworks over the water at midnight, and, of course, more than enough to drink. Games were set for anyone who wanted them, and there was plenty of space for those who just wanted to sit and talk. It was simply perfect, just like every other party the two threw together.
“How’s it looking?” Glimmer called from the kitchen.
Catra stepped back from the large folding table in the middle of the room, set with a deck of cards and enough cups for any game they could think of. “Fucking phenomenal,” she said with a grin.
They had chosen Glimmer’s parents’ beach house. It was a beautiful house with a back patio overlooking the sound, and was definitely large enough to host one hell of a party. Her parents were alright with them using it so long as nothing was broken and they cleaned up afterwards. Bow and Adora had promised them that they would chaperone or whatever to get Glimmer’s parents to calm down a bit.
It was only 6:30, far too early for anyone to arrive yet, but Catra was still caught off guard by the front door of the house opening. She calmed immediately when she saw the goofy smile of her wife holding boxes of takeout.
“Hey, Adora,” she said.
“Dinner!” Adora announced cheerfully as she held the bags up and shook them slightly.
“Thank god , I’m starving,” Glimmer said as she grabbed the food from Adora and set it down on the kitchen counter, sifting through the bags.
“How’s the setup going?” Adora asked as she took her food from Glimmer.
“Pretty great,” Catra replied. “I think we’re basically done. An hour early, too.”
“We work fast when we listen to Lady Gaga,” Glimmer commented. Catra seconded that.
“It looks incredible,” Bow said. “You guys did a great job.” He sat down at the table next to Glimmer, as he always did.
The four ate in relative silence in an attempt to save their social batteries for the party. It was a comfortable silence; nobody felt any pressure to talk about anything. It would be a dramatic change for what they all knew was coming.
Catra was starting to get nervous. She had barely seen Adora around since people arrived, and she knew how her wife got in situations like parties; typically there was far too much going on, and she needed something to help keep her calm. She had half a mind to find Perfuma and tell Adora to go smoke with her in hopes that it might help with her anxiety.
She was just rounding the corner to check some more rooms when a strong hand grabbed her arm and pulled her in for a tight hug. Of course she immediately recognized the arms that wrapped around her shoulders, and felt a wave of relief wash over her.
“Hey, Adora,” she mumbled into Adora’s collarbones.
“Mm, heyy,” she replied slowly with a kiss to the top of her head. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too. Where’ve you been? I’ve been looking for you.”
“Honestly? I’m not to know.” Catra laughed at that, pulling away to look her wife in the eyes. Before she could get the chance to say anything, Adora spoke again. “You look really, uh… what’s the word… uh, it’s something like beautiful but it’s like more than that.”
“Mhmm, how much have you had to drink?”
“I’on know, Glimmer fixed me a something.” Catra nodded and grabbed her wife’s hand, pulling her through the crowd of people to find Glimmer.
Glimmer, however, was preoccupied with a game of rage cage and was supposedly winning, though there aren’t really winners, just one loser. She was standing around a table between Lonnie and Sea Hawk, who was notoriously bad at most drinking games but still for whatever reason always wanted to play.
“Hey, Sparkles, can I steal you for thirty seconds?” she asked as she lightly pulled on the edge of her sleeve.
“No, you can not,” Glimmer replied, watching the two ping pong balls bounce around intently. One was in Bow’s possession and the other in Scorpia’s, which didn’t put her in any immediate danger of having to drink but the game moved far too quickly to ever feel safe.
“Fuck you, I’m asking anyway. What’d you give this one?” Catra asked, gesturing to Adora, who was standing right behind her and slightly swaying back and forth. Glimmer’s head whipped around for only a second, long enough to see that Adora was, in fact, somehow in another plane of existence already. Glimmer was convinced that she would need maybe ten shots to get to that level.
“Literally a shot of Pink Whitney in, like, a full cup of Sprite. Is she really drunk off of that?” she asked in disbelief. “I knew she was a lightweight, but this is just embarrassing.”
“That’s it, right?” she asked.
“Yes, I promise. Scout’s honor.” Glimmer held up her middle three fingers in an attempt to seem more trustworthy, but Catra just rolled her eyes.
“The only one of us who was a scout was Bow,” she said flatly. “But I trust your word, Sparkles.”
She was going to continue when Adora wrapped her arms around her and pulled her close, placing a single kiss to the back of her neck. “You look really good tonight, by the way,” she mumbled.
“Behave yourself,” she scolded halfheartedly. In all honesty, she loved when Adora was affectionate, she just thought it was rather rude that she was doing it while she was literally in the middle of a conversation with Glimmer. It was the principle of doing unto others what they would do unto you or however that phrase went. She wouldn’t exactly be thrilled if Glimmer and Bow started making out while they were talking.
Adora grumbled something and pulled back, opting instead to just hold her wife’s hand. Catra squeezed her hand lightly, a small gesture she usually did to make sure she was alright. Adora squeezed back.
The two stayed to watch the game of rage cage, partly because it was a genuinely entertaining game to watch but also Catra was secretly hoping Glimmer would have to drink the bitch cup. She knew that they let Mermista prepare the bitch cup, and she was notoriously ruthless at that. Catra remembered the first time they had played together and the cup ended up containing an absolutely unholy mix of three different flavors of White Claw in addition to pickle juice and coffee creamer. Needless to say, Kyle threw up when he ended up having to drink it. It was very entertaining.
Almost as if it was a gift from the gods, Glimmer accidentally landed in the bitch cup. Catra cheered as Glimmer downed it in one gulp, grimacing and shuddering at the taste.
“Fuck, what was in that?” she asked.
“Um,” Mermista started, “I don’t really remember. Definitely that one flavor of Truly that sorta tastes like mac and cheese, orange Fanta, and the powder from a Baby Bottle Pop.” She shrugged.
“Oh! Cute!” Catra laughed. “Hope you enjoyed, Sparkles.”
“Go fuck yourself,” she said with a grin.
“Fuck me yourself, coward.”
“No,” Adora interjected, standing in front of Catra. “No no.”
“We were just messing around. I promise,” Glimmer said, suddenly completely serious. “Besides, Catra is too much of a brat for my tastes.”
“Oh, please,” Catra scoffed. “You wouldn’t be able to date someone who isn’t nice to you all the time.”
“You got me there.” She shrugged. “Anyway, beer pong anyone?”
“Hell yeah, sign me up,” Catra offered.
“I’d love to take you down a level,” Lonnie offered with a smirk.
“You’re on.”
Catra smirked, eyes shooting up to meet her opponent’s, before she released the ball and watched it fall into the final cup with ease. Lonnie rolled her eyes as she downed the final cup, mumbling something about cheating and walking away. Adora immediately wrapped her arms around her, hoisting her into the air and spinning in circles.
“That’s my wife!” she yelled. “Beer pong champ!”
“Alright, alright, put me down, you dork,” Catra laughed. Adora begrudgingly set her back down on the floor, but the goofy smile remained plastered across her face. “What, would you have divorced me if I didn’t make that?”
“Probably,” she said with a shrug.
Catra stopped, eyes darting back and forth between Adora’s, before she laughed. “You couldn’t find someone else to put up with you if you tried. ”
“Maybe whoever beat you in beer pong.”
“Well I guess it’s a good thing I’ve literally never been beaten then.”
Adora furrowed her brows. “Not even once?”
“Nope.”
“Can I try to beat you?”
Catra snorted. “You wouldn’t be able to under the best of circumstances.”
“That feels like a challenge.”
Her eyes met Adora’s, and she instantly recognized the burning of competition. “Alright, you’re on.” She set up the cups again and slid the ping pong balls across the table towards her wife. “You can start.”
Adora’s first shot went in easily, but it took her a few more rounds to sink another. And of course on every turn Catra made at least one, which led to Adora getting drunker and drunker. Catra half jokingly mentioned putting water in her wife’s cup instead, but Adora immediately protested. “If you c’n make all these shots while drunk then, uh… fuck you,” she had said.
Another round passed, then another. Catra won both, with Adora only ever making about three of her shots. She was almost embarrassingly bad at it. That did, however, lead to Adora being quite possibly the drunkest she had ever been. Again, it was almost embarrassing, but ended up being more endearing than anything else.
It was no surprise when she collapsed on the couch. Catra shook her head, chuckling, and sat in a chair next to her as she packed another bowl with Perfuma.
“It’s almost midnight!” Glimmer shouted, ushering everyone out onto the balcony. Every year, a beautiful firework show was set off over the water, which was always an incredible sight. Catra and Adora had seen it quite a few times in the past, and every time without fail it felt like all of the magic had suddenly returned to the universe all at once.
“Catraaaaa,” Adora groaned from the couch and reached her arms out. Catra giggled, grabbing one of her arms and trying to pull her up. Trying was the operative word there, seeing as Adora did not in fact land on her feet and instead was sent tumbling to the floor.
“Oh my god, you two are useless,” Glimmer huffed. She grabbed one of Adora’s arms and hoisted her to her feet before mumbling something about hating the both of them and walking back onto the balcony.
Adora rubbed the back of her neck with a sheepish grin before offering a hand, which Catra immediately took. The two walked onto the balcony and stood next to Glimmer. Adora took her hand away and instead draped her arm across Catra’s shoulders, pulling her closer. Catra did not complain.
“Ten,” Bow started.
“Nine,” everyone else joined in.
“Eight.”
Adora looked over at Catra. Catra was already looking back.
“Seven.”
It had been an incredible year for the two of them, all in all. It was their first New Years together after their wedding, a memory that was still very fresh in their minds.
“Six.”
Though they were still in university and couldn’t afford nice things, it didn’t matter. They had each other, and they had enough love to keep the world warm for decades to come.
“Five.”
Catra had that look in her eyes again. That look that Adora could never quite place, but she knew she loved it. It was the same look she had when she proposed.
“Four.”
Adora had that smile, that damned smile, the one that Catra fell in love with in the first place. It was a smile that to anyone else would have seemed so dorky, but Catra knew what it represented. Hell, even Glimmer knew judging by what she had commented once.
“Three.”
Anyone could tell just from looking at the two of them that they were soulmates. They had gone through hell to be with each other, and neither of them regretted it for a moment. The love they shared was deep, and it was beautiful and all-encompassing. It was like a warm summer’s evening; it was a feeling of comfort the likes of which had never been seen by the world before.
“Two.”
The moments they shared together in the past paled in comparison to what their future held.
“One.”
And how could they be scared of the future when everything they had was built on love?
“Happy New Years!”
Catra, despite the fact that she was so drunk she couldn’t even stand up straight anymore, pulled Adora into the most gentle kiss she could manage. It was a simple gesture, one that the two had done countless times before, but it felt different. Adora wasn’t sure what was louder, the fireworks that had begun going off over the water or her heart beating in her chest.
They pulled apart, the absolute sweetest of smiles shining brighter than the stars could ever imagine. They silently watched the rest of the fireworks in awe at how they lit up the sky with beautiful shades of blue and gold and red.
Adora sniffled, making Catra whip her head around to look at her.
“Hey, are you crying?” she asked, reaching a hand up to wipe a tear off of her cheek.
“I just love you so much ,” she said, laughing through her tears. “You’re, like, my best friend, and I’m just- fucking, uh… so lucky.”
Catra’s mind went blank, her breath caught in her chest. She’s heard it a million times before, but every time it managed to make her heart stop the same way it did the first time. She couldn’t help but break into the widest smile her face could manage.
“You’re such a dork. I’m so glad I married you,” she said. “Now, come on, I think there’s a game of rage cage calling my name.”
She giggled, grabbing her wife’s hand and pulling her back into the house.
Neither of them remember the rest of that night.
Adora awoke the next morning to Glimmer trying to step over her. She groaned, blinking the sleep from her eyes and propping herself up on her elbow. She had somehow fallen asleep on the stairs unknowingly with Catra right next to her. She chuckled softly and planted a kiss on her forehead before heading to the kitchen.
Fuck, she loved her so much.