#definitely a work in progress! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

inkedroplets · 1 year

Text

You Owe me a New Desk

“I know I sprang this on you—” “Because you knew if you didn’t I would say no,” Kara said hotly, wondering if she had also purposefully chosen to tell her at the DEO to stop her from making too big a scene. She glared at Alex, hoping to see a hint of guilt on her implacable face, annoyed when she found none.

“It's dinner, Kara. you act like I’m trying to marry you off,” Alex said, arms already crossed over her chest, having expected resistance and prepared accordingly.

“Not yet, anyway,” Kara replied, shaking her head again, her hands still on her hips, fingers digging in to stop her from mimicking Alex’s pose, knowing she would cut a far more intimidating figure. “But at the rate, you’re going …” “It is one date,” Alex said. She snaked her right arm free and held up her index finger, although Kara suspected she would have much rather held up the middle one. “You don’t even need to think of it as a date. Think of it as a night out.” “A night out,” Kara repeated. “Yeah. Do you remember those?” “I missed a few game nights,” Kara said, her already fraying patience dissolving to nothing as they slipped back into the same quagmire they had been stuck in for months now. It seemed no matter what topic, whether it be something as banal as the weather or a metahuman attacking downtown like all roads lead to Rome. Every conversation with Alex always led back to Lena and how (in Alex's words) she needed to move on. As if it could ever be that simple. Although to everyone else it certainly seemed that way. Life for everyone else had simply seemed to have gone on. As if Lena's sudden absence was something that had happened a long time ago.

There had been a few desultory outings where the conversation often lagged and some of the takeout that normally disappeared so quickly remained untouched. She remembered a game night that had fizzled out after a brief game of Exploding Kittens and turned into an impromptu movie night that had been something Kara had needed to get through rather than enjoy.

But the group (minus Kara) had found their footing soon after that. Karaoke where lyrics were belted out (oftentimes offkey) and at the appropriate eardrum-shattering decibel. Game nights filled with laughter interspersed with the occasional howl of indignation when someone invariably pulled too far ahead in points or when a house rule had been broken whether on accident or on purpose.

Kara had watched it happen in a state of incredulity, bearing witness to the speed at which things had returned to normal for everyone else, at how fast their fractured circle had closed in reaction to Lena's absence. Life had simply gone on for them. But not for her. And seeing her friends joke and laugh, and have spirited debates over who out of the group would have the best chance of surviving a zombie apocalypse and what were the superior pizza toppings, turned her incredulity to white-hot anger. Anger that had all the forethought of a bull in a china shop. It rampaged around in her chest, seeing red everywhere, looking for something to smash, to gore. It was why she had eventually stopped going to game night, (even if all she had done since Lena’s absence had been to act as a scorekeeper).

“You’ve missed six,” Alex countered “Six then.” “And every time someone tries to make plans with you, you always find an excuse not to—” “Me being busy is not an excuse,” Kara fired back and gave her cape a hasty flutter, drawing attention to it the same way a magician might before attempting some sleight of hand. In truth, it was an excuse, but with how busy she had kept herself, it would have been hard to accuse her of lying. She had practically begged Andrea for more work, happily snapping up whatever puff piece or blogpost that she threw her way. Andrea had been far too happy that her Pulitzer-winning reporter had suddenly come around on soft news after being so vehemently against it to question why she was now more than happy to pen an article about ‘What your favorite kind of tea says about you’. She had also redoubled her efforts as Supergirl, spending more of her time patrolling the city. Anything to keep busy, to keep herself distracted. Not that it was ever enough. “You can take one night off, Kara…” Alex let out a sigh that sounded like it had been kept under pressure for a very long time, almost a hiss as her gaze that had been so steely just moments ago softened. “I know this has been hard…” No, you don’t.

“I know you miss her.” “I don’t miss her!” Kara shouted. The ensuing silence and the feeling of suddenly being watched as everyone in the room turned to look in her direction made her cheeks burn. Doing her best to ignore the fact that to the others in the room, she and Alex had become the only two players on the stage of a sold-out show she stalked forward so that she could lean close enough to whisper to her. “Kara…” “I do not miss her,” Kara murmured. She pressed a hand flat against her forehead and let it slip over her eyes briefly like a shroud. In the transient darkness, she saw herself. Not a perfect reflection but her as she had looked trapped in the Fortress’ defenses that Lena had reprogrammed on the fly. Defenses that had been put in place originally as a Luthor failsafe… “Okay,” Alex said placatingly. “You don’t miss her. After what she did to you—” And what did we do to her? Kara thought, the image of herself fading from her mind’s eye as she let her hand fall back to her side. “Can we not, Alex? Please?”

“Why don’t you head home for the night?” Alex suggested as if she wasn’t the reason that Kara had stopped by the DEO in the first place instead of heading straight home after her patrol. “Just think about it, okay? The date… or not date.” “Yeah,” Kara said, already beating a hasty retreat towards the door. She could hear the indistinct whispers of some of the agents in the room as clearly as if they were whispering into her ear instead of someone else’s, ignoring the looks of concern on many of the faces she passed.

I’m fine, she told herself. She repeated that to herself with each step like a prayer. And when she had put the DEO behind her, had flown up high enough so that the city below had become a bed of glittering jewels, she repeated it aloud with the same quiet desperation one might have when earnestly wishing on a star. “I’m fine.”

Kara wasn’t fine. How could she be when there didn’t seem to be a single potsticker in all of National City? She had tried all of her usual places and been turned away for one reason or another at all of them. Catching them as they were closing for the night, being swamped with orders, and just being plain out of food (although Kara could have sworn she smelled something cooking in the back).

She had however been offered an apology each time she had been turned away. Five apologies of varying sincerity did little to blunt her disappointment at being denied one of the few things that might bring her a tiny bit of comfort. It wasn’t until she had returned home defeated that she realized how strange it had been that every place had known her by name. Not that she didn’t frequent any of them enough for them to know her name, but she knew for a fact that none of them did. She had been a regular customer by virtue only, always having to give her name (sometimes several times) whenever she picked up an order. Not that she minded. But it had been odd to suddenly become a known entity at all five restaurants. Even stranger that a few of them had done a very noticeable double-take when she had walked in as if they had been expecting her.

The words: Could this day get any worse? trembled on her lips when she collapsed onto her couch, still in her Supergirl suit. She didn’t dare speak them aloud, though. She knew better than to tempt fate. Knew from experience that life could turn on a dime and be unimaginably cruel. Krypton’s destruction. Having to watch her home be destroyed before her eyes and at that moment (and for a long time after) a selfish part of her had wished she had been destroyed along with it.

Compared to that, how could a squabble with Alex and being denied her favorite food ever measure up? Only, she knew it wasn’t just that. It was being faced with the fact that her passion for journalism, something that had fulfilled her in a way that Supergirl never could, had seemingly vanished and her attempts (that had become more and more desperate) to recapture it had only made her more sure that it might be gone for good. It was the distance growing between her and all her loved ones and how little she seemed to care as she watched it happen. It was the unimaginable bitterness that ate away at her like acid from how she had hurt Lena and how Lena had hurt her. It was how at times there seemed to be no bottom to her pain. It was the recurring nightmare she had frequently of being back in the Fortress. Watching Lena disappear into the portal with Myriad. Trapped once more in that glittering cage. Even the most vivid of nightmares couldn’t replicate the pain of kryptonite, but what it could do was convince her sleeping mind that she was trapped there. Trapped with no way of escape. And when she woke up drenched in a cold sweat, she wasn’t sure whether she was in her bed, in the Fortress, or back in the Phantom Zone…

“It’s the potstickers,” she muttered. Her stomach gave a very loud rumble a few moments later, making it that much easier to pretend that’s all it was. She had plenty to work with in her fridge. At a quick glance with her X-Ray vision, she saw leftover pizza, Thai food, and half of a burrito that looked about the same size and general shape as a small anaconda. But no potstickers. “Maybe if Alex didn’t invite me to the DEO under false pretenses to set me up on a blind date,” she muttered, finding it easy to imagine a scenario where if she had arrived only ten minutes earlier her favorite place wouldn’t have run out of food. That very likely outcome annoyed her almost more than Alex trying to dictate her love life. Lena would understand. The thought was like a bolt from the blue, too quick for her to stop herself from thinking it and too ingrained in her to be surprised that she had. Lena had been the one she had always gone to when she wanted to vent, especially if it was about Alex. She had always seemed to know when Kara simply wanted her to listen to her vent and when she wanted advice. Something that Alex still hadn’t mastered. While she meant well, Kara thought she approached helping her with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball at times. Her hamfisted attempt at getting her out of her funk by setting her up with a stranger was evidence of that.

Alex is being so annoying today! You wouldn’t believe what she did. She actually tried to set me up on a date!! Sometimes she just needs to mind her own business!! And every Chinese place in the city is out of potstickers. And when I say ‘every’ Chinese place I mean every single place. I checked them all.Writing the text was cathartic, the modern-day version of writing a letter that you had no intention of sending. The relief would be fleeting, of course, although Kara had no idea just how fleeting.

She had tossed her phone aside and begun taking mental stock of what she had in her cupboards and fridge, trying to figure out what to do for dinner when her phone chirped weakly from underneath one of her throw pillows.

She swiped her finger lazily over the screen and felt her stomach enter freefall.

“Oh, no no no no…” Kara squeezed her phone hard enough to produce an ominous cracking noise that made her drop it directly onto her face. Flinching, she let it slide down into the crook of her neck before scooping it up, careful not to crush it (regardless of how tempting that sounded at the moment).

She dragged her index finger over the screen and stared open-mouthed at the message she had never meant to send, but had done so anyway. She let her eyes unfocus and slowly zero in again as if that might make the message disappear.

When her vision sharpened again and she saw the message was still there, Kara let out a low moan, wishing she could have willed it out of existence through sheer desperation, certain that if such a thing were possible she would have no trouble at all pulling it off.

But it was the message just below it that made her do a double-take.

I couldn't care less about the potstickers, but please, do go on about how awful Alex is…

The message was so unabashedly Lena that Kara had no trouble imagining her speaking the words aloud, the imagery so vivid that she could have sworn she heard Lena's voice echoing in her head.

She stared at it a moment longer before she typed out a very hasty, I'm sorry, not sure what else she could say. Her thumb hovered over the send button, a bitter smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. That wouldn't get a response. She was certain of that. Not when the other apologies she had sent had never once elicited a response from Lena. The apologies she had agonized over sending in the first place and regretted on the days when her anger at Lena outweighed the pain of missing her, of hurting her.

#most definitely a work in progress #I don't know how to share private posts so everybody gets to bear witness #supercorp #can something be angsty and smutty at the same time?

426 notes · View notes