Work Text:
David Singh felt like nine months had to be enough time to get over Barry Allen. But he felt a prickle of nerves at the thought of Barry's return to work. It was mostly a formality, everyone knew Barry would just do what he wanted.
‘That was maybe unkind,’ David thought as he made his way to his office. Anyways, nine months had to be enough time for him to move on. Sure, it was hard to get over someone when they were in a coma, and being the man's boss and friends with the Wests, David got regular updates.
So yeah maybe he had been worried, it was logical, Barry worked for him and David needed to know if he needed a replacement. It wasn't like he spent a lot of time thinking about it. Or that moment in his office where he almost believed Barry didn't know about his feelings.
That was ridiculous, it felt most of the time that David had been holding up a giant neon sign that said “I'm in love with you” whenever they were in the same room. Oh sure he tried to hide it under his gruff exterior. But he had failed so spectacularly that even the mayor had teased him regularly.
It had been nine months and David had definitely moved on. And if the men he went out with had various traits in common with Barry Allen, well, they weren't sticking around long enough to ever meet his coworkers. Anyways a lot of people in the world had the same traits so it meant nothing.
David pushed all thoughts of Barry to the side and settled at his desk and pulled up the previous shift's report; he had some time to kill before Allen came to plead his case.
When he looked up at the knock on his office door he had to face some truths. The first being that Barry looked really good for a man just out of a nine month coma. The second being that nine months was not enough time to get over Barry Allen.
David was going to have to ruthlessly suppress that crush. Remind himself of all Barry's annoying habits. But for a moment David couldn't bring himself to care about his crush, because Barry was alive, healthy and in front of him. David gave himself a moment to appreciate the moment before squashing it like a bug.
He could do this.
“This is mostly just a formality, Mr. Allen, we both know you'll do what you want anyways.” David's words rattled around Barry's brain for a long time after their meeting ended. Barry knew he had an uphill battle and this new superspeed thing was going to complicate things.
But when he first walked into David's office he had hope. He had paused for a few long seconds watching the captain reading his reports and Barry was sure he could fix things. And the look David gave him when he first saw him, well Barry wasn't sure how he missed this before. Now that he knew what to look for, the relief and affection radiated off David for a moment before the captain remembered himself and closed himself off.
That moment gave Barry the hope he needed to believe that this could be fixed.
That he could tell David his feelings and convince him that he had not used David's against him. He also had to make sure that David knew his feelings were serious and he wasn't making fun of him. He knew it wouldn't be easy, not with the way David's face hardened as he got his smile under control.
Barry just had to figure out how to convince David not only did Barry not use his feelings against him, but returned them while dealing with his return to work and new super speed abilities. This was going to be really complicated really fast.
It was probably the smart move to let David go, but Barry wasn't giving up that dream.
So Barry tried. He got to work on time, mostly. He of course had speedster stuff to do, but anything that was remotely considered medical, he made sure to tell David in advance. He still got caught up at star labs, but it was easier to cover that now that Joe knew.
He was still late to crime scenes, how with superspeed he still managed that was a mystery of the universe. His reports were mostly done timely. He started really strong but then a few of them, well just got away from him.
But he was trying, because the time he had to do the report as his captain was on his way to the lab, had been terrifyingly close to giving his double life away. Also was not a tenable solution.
Barry was heading up to his lab with Iris, when the desk office called to him, she smiled at him, and nodded to the stairs, “you've got a visitor in your lab, and you should be grateful the captain is not in.”
Barry looked towards Singh's office, the door was shut and the light was out. He frowned, “he's not here?”
“He's been at city hall for the last four hours.”
He thanked her and went up with Iris. There was Felicity. And suddenly he knew why the desk sergeant warned him. The captain tolerated visitors, but the reminder of Barry's field trip might ruffle his feathers.
Later, after the awkward double date, and rescuing the train full of people, and the realization that even if they were perfectly perfect for each other it just wasn't going to happen. Barry sat on a train across from a friend, he'd just kissed, and they talked.
“It's not Iris is it?”
“Hmm?”
“The person you're in love with, I thought it was Iris, but I don't think it is.”
“I mean,” he rubbed the back of his neck, “I definitely have a crush on Iris, who wouldn't, but no it's not her.”
“Then who is it?” she asked, “you can tell me, it can't be any worse than me being in love with my boss.”
Barry coughed slightly, and her eyes went wide, “no Barry!”
“We're really not that different, you and I, ” his smile was rueful.
“Tell me all about it, all about him”
Barry rolled his eyes at himself, “he's just good, you know, sure he can be grumpy and he has a short fuse at times, but he cares so much, even when I don't deserve it.”
“What's stopping you?”
“It's so complicated,” he moaned, “it's so complicated and it shouldn't be, it's mutual, Felicity, it's mutual and I can't do anything about it.”
“What do you mean?” she was pretty sure she knew what he meant, she just needed it spelled out for her to be sure.
Barry rubbed his forehead, and sighed, “I have feelings for him and he has them for me and there is nothing I can do about it.”
“Why not? It's not some ‘I'm a superhero I can't risk it, brooding, no one can know who I am’ Oliver Queen sort of thing is it?”
Barry laughed, “no, it's more a ‘I didn't know he liked me, but everyone else did and he thinks I took advantage of his feelings when I went to Starling City and lied to get put on the investigation’ thing”
“You would never! You didn't, did you?”
“No!” Barry pressed his palms into his brow, “I didn't know, apparently everyone knew but me, even the mayor.”
“Wow, there's being oblivious, then there's that,” she grimaced, then softened, “have you talked to him, cleared the air?”
“Not yet. The explosion and coma happened, now this,” he said, vibrating his hand. “I kind of figured I'd work up to it, maybe get to work on time, stop disappearing, and then maybe talk to him.”
“I think you should talk to him.”
“That's scarier than facing the cold gun.”
“I know. But it's probably worth it.”
“So much has changed and I don't want to know if that is something that did too.”
“There's only one way to find out, and that's to talk to him.”
“I will, eventually.”
“Barry!”
“What, even I can't outrun heartbreak.”
Felicity understood, she smiled and moved to sit next to him, pushing her arm through his and leaning against his shoulder. They sat together for a few more minutes silently commiserating.
Back in his office, David Singh was pretty miserable too, especially when he had gotten back from the mayor's office and the gossip around the lab was about a pretty blonde from Starling City visiting Barry. And that Eddie and Iris were going on a double date with Barry and said blonde.
He picked up his phone and hovered over the contact information for the guy, Rob, he'd met at a bar a few days earlier.
The conversation they had was fun and easy, he was cute, and a little nerdy, and maybe what David needed was something without complications.
He hesitated for a moment. Then put his phone back down. Maybe tomorrow he'll call. Maybe by then he'd be over Barry Allen.
David wasn't sure either of those things were going to happen.