Archive of Our Own

“What I like about Christmas is that you can make people forget the past with the present.” – Don Marquis

Kara hated Christmas.

Actually, that was a lie.

Christmas was her favourite holiday and had been for as long as she could remember. The food, the presents, the company of family and friends... She loved every single part of it.

This year, however... Maybe the Grinch had the right idea after all.

Okay, maybe she was overreacting a little... but it was true that she wasn't seeing a whole lot to look forward to this festive season.

Sure, she had a nice apartment, a job she loved, a cousin who was like her own sister living in the same city, close friends she could rely on in times of need... and, until several months ago, a boyfriend she had thought was 'The One'.

'Had' being the operative word.

Now she was facing a Christmas where everyone in her life had someone special except her. Aside from her parents and her aunt and uncle Eliza and Jeremiah, there was Alex who would be bringing her girlfriend Sam as well as Eve and Winn who had finally decided a while back to give the whole 'dating a friend' thing a try and were still going strong.

If life were perfect, James would be coming to the annual Danvers family gathering – that she would be hosting this year, no less – as her boyfriend and she would have been completely happy.

Instead, she was going to be the only single person present, everyone was going to give her those sympathetic looks that would make her feel even more miserable and her whole night was going to be spent imagining her impending future as the spinster aunt and local crazy cat lady.

And it was only the beginning of December.

Needless to say, she dearly wished she could be done with the whole month already. And New Year too, for that matter. Being surrounded by happy couples celebrating the occasion with a kiss...

Oh god, she realised with a kind of dulled horror, I'M the Grinch.

Okay, she had to get rid of this mindset this very second. She absolutely was not going to be the one trying to ruin everyone else's enjoyment of the holiday season just because she couldn't be happy herself. She was going to be the sweet, cheerful and all-smiles Kara Danvers that everyone knew and loved.

Now if only everyone else in her life would just cooperate and not strive to make her even more miserable than she already was...

...and right now, that was unsurprisingly her perpetually grumpy boss Snapper Carr.

Kara wasn't entirely sure what she'd done to piss him off – recently, anyway – but whatever it was, tasking her with writing a piece about places in National City where people could find unusual Christmas gifts seemed a little excessive for a punishment.

Now here she was on a Friday afternoon in a part of the city she was unfamiliar with, dead on her feet, starving and almost assuredly lost. The one bright side to the whole situation was that she had stumbled across a quaint little antique shop run by a mysterious Japanese woman who had the strangest collection of knick-knacks for sale. Hopefully that along with the handful of other similarly strange places she had found – people bought occult stuff as Christmas gifts, right? – would meet Snapper's vague yet simultaneously specific requirements...

Right now, however, she had to find some food or she really was going to die.

Wandering aimlessly, she tried to figure out which of the restaurants she could spot were within her budget. Some of them were very obviously of the high-class variety so she dismissed them as options even though her stomach protested any further delays in getting fed. She quite literally couldn't afford to go broke buying a single meal especially not when she was only halfway through her Christmas shopping.

It was as she was scanning the signs further up the street that she spotted the absolute last person in the entire world she wanted to meet now and possibly for the rest of time:

James.

Arms linked with a woman she was sure was his new and very gorgeous girlfriend.

And they were headed in her direction.

Shock transformed into full-blown panic in a heartbeat as she stood with her feet rooted to the pavement and watched the couple slowly come closer and closer as if in slow motion. The only saving grace was that the two of them were so absorbed with one another that they were unaware they were being stared at very blatantly. Kara was almost certain the woman didn't know who she was – unless James was in the habit of telling his new girlfriends about the girls whose hearts he'd broken in the past which would be weird and also very mean – but James would most definitely recognise her.

In her current state, dying would be preferable.

They were still coming her way and James thankfully still hadn't looked up and spotted her.

Desperate and frantic, she blindly took a sharp turn and barged through the door of the nearest establishment before turning around and pushing it shut as if she expected them to come barging in after her. Heart hammering away in her chest and her mind a jumbled mess, she tried to peek out the window and see if she could spot the couple. Only once she was sure they had not only passed her hiding place but were also far away enough that she was going to dare venture out, make a beeline for the nearest subway station and flee back to the safety of her apartment.

“Uh, sorry but we're not open yet.”

Kara let out a scream of surprise at the unexpected voice behind her and whirled around with her hands clapped over her mouth to find a guy roughly her age staring at her in mild alarm as he held his hands up to silently show that he meant no harm.

Despite everything going on in that moment, a small part of her brain took the time to note that he was pretty cute. Short dark hair, clean-shaven, eyes an unusual and striking mix of blue and grey, a pretty fit-looking body from what she could tell...

...Wait, what was it he'd said again?

Tearing her eyes away from the cute guy – she really hoped she hadn't been staring –, she looked around and finally realised what kind of place she'd chosen as her impromptu hiding place.

The solid wooden flooring, the similar dark wood chairs and benches with cushioned seats, the old-fashioned framed photos on the walls, the counter separating her and the cute guy... She was in a bar. A very traditional one at that. Which, as the cute guy had said, was very clearly not open yet.

“Oh,” she squeaked. “Um.”

“Are you okay?” he asked her with genuine concern as he slowly lowered his hands. “You're not in trouble, are you? Because if you are, I can... well, call the police for you, I guess?”

“N-No!” Her outburst caused his eyes to widen in alarm again, and she mentally cursed herself as she tried to get her voice back under control. “I-I-I mean, it's okay. I'm... It's just...” she floundered, unsure what to say even as her gaze darted towards the window in an effort to spot James. “My, um... I saw my ex on the street and... uh...”

“Ah. And I'm guessing you don't want to see him and vice versa?”

Aware that she made for a pretty pathetic figure at the moment, she dropped her gaze to the floor and silently nodded.

“Okay then.”

Having expected to hear something along the lines of 'I get it but I really can't let you stay', she took several seconds to process his actual response and snapped her head back up to stare blankly at him. “W-What?”

He gave her a smile that communicated sympathy and understanding. “Stay as long as you want. I don't mind since I'm just setting up... unless you're planning on robbing me.”

The last part had been said with a wink and a cheeky grin, making it clear that he was simply teasing her, and somehow that was enough to calm her nerves even if it was just a little. “No, I'm not going to do that and I'll be out of your hair in no time, I promise.”

His grin shifted from teasing to something warmer, causing her heart to do a tiny somersault. “Like I said, you're not being a bother so stay as long as you want. Feel free to take a seat; you look like you've been running a marathon or something.”

Just as she was about to thank him and politely decline his offer, her stomach loudly and angrily reminded her that it still hadn't been fed.

Dead silence descended upon the bar as she flushed bright red and started wishing for the ground to open up and swallow her whole.

“...Are you by any chance hungry or did a lion sneak in here without me noticing?” he asked, his voice tinged with barely suppressed laughter.

Gaze firmly pointed at her feet, she kept silent and continued praying to whichever god would listen for a swift and painless death just so she could escape this mortifying situation.

A soft 'thunk' caught her attention and she looked up to find that he'd slid a small bowl of nuts across the bar in her direction, bemused smile still firmly in place. “Here. It's not much but it should tide you over while I cook something up for you.”

Kara couldn't be sure but she thought her jaw might have cratered the floor. “W-What?”

“...I'll cook something up for you?” he repeated slowly, his smile dimming much to her regret. “Or is it the nuts you're objecting to? Because they're fresh if you're worried about germs. Wait, you're not allergic, are you?”

“N-No.” She shook her head both as an answer and in an attempt to clear her head. “I-I mean, I'm not allergic. It's just... Why are you being so... nice?”

He cocked his head to the side, a hint of a smile playing on his lips once more. “Well, I'd like to think I'm not the kind of guy who can look away when someone needs help, for one.” That mischievous grin of his made its return, accompanied by another roguish wink. “Especially when that someone is as beautiful as you.”

Her blush which had started to fade came back in full force. “Y-You... You're just teasing me, aren't you?” she accused him hotly. He couldn't possibly be... flirting with her... could he?

“Maybe,” he chuckled and threw her another wink. “Has anyone ever told you you're really cute when you blush?”

Okay, now he was definitely just messing with her, she was sure of it. “If you're just going to make fun of me-”

He held his hands up in surrender and tried to look serious although the corners of his lips were still twitching. “All right, all right, I'll stop. But the offer of food still stands if you want it.”

Once again, her stomach pre-emptively vetoed her polite refusal by grumbling even louder than before. “...Food would be nice,” she mumbled, feeling a mixture of defeat and humiliation.

To her relief, he didn't tease her again and simply nodded. “Food it is then. Any preferences?”

“...Something that doesn't take too long to cook?” she ventured cautiously as she moved to sit at the nearest bar stool, her hand already reaching out for the bowl of nuts. “I don't want to seem like I'm being demanding but-”

“I totally understand.” He turned to head towards the doorway she presumed led to the bar's kitchen before stopping in his tracks and turning back to face her. “Sorry, I forgot to ask: Do you want a drink? I mean, this is a bar, after all.”

“I only drink club soda,” she replied automatically before she realised how rude she sounded and blushed again. God, she seemed to keep doing that around him – both the putting her foot in her mouth thing and imitating a tomato. “S-Sorry, I, um... Water's-”

The muffled sound of a familiar laugh reached her ears, causing the rest of her sentence to die in her throat. Ever so slowly, she turned in her seat towards the window only to find James and his new girlfriend standing just outside the bar, chatting away indistinctly with giant smiles on their faces. Her only consolation was that they were too busy staring at each other to look inside and spot her.

Being so suddenly reminded of why and how she had ended up in this very bar killed every last bit of positivity in her... along with her usual self-restraint.

“Actually, you know what?” she said decisively as she turned back around to face her only companion who looked back with open curiosity. “Forget the water; I'll have that drink. And make it a strong one please.”

A construction crew had moved into her skull overnight and was now enthusiastically at work.

That was the only explanation Kara could come up with for why her head felt like a dozen jackhammers were happily destroying it from the inside out.

Letting out an agonised whimper, she forced her eyes open and thanked whichever god was listening that the curtains were thick and completely shut, preventing most of the light outside from coming in. She closed her eyes again and sluggishly pushed herself upright with one hand, pushing the blanket off her body in the process, while her other hand pressed itself against her throbbing skull in a futile effort to suppress the pain.

When she opened her eyes once more, the first thing they focused on was her glasses folded neatly on the bedside table... right next to a glass full of some brownish liquid with a small handwritten note taped to it that said, 'Drink this. It'll help.'

At this point, she would've downed a gallon of cyanide just to be blessedly free of her current torment so she wasted no time putting on her glasses, pulling the note free and picking up the glass.

In hindsight, taking a mouthful of some unknown liquid had not been the wisest of decisions. The incomprehensible mixture of flavours that hit her tongue made her choke but she still ended up swallowing some before she could yank the glass away from her mouth.

“Oh god,” she gagged as she tried to wipe the taste away with her sleeve. What the hell had she just ingested, toxic waste? Just as she all but slammed the glass back down on the bedside table, however, she realised with a start that her head no longer felt like it was imploding and she could think clearly.

The relief that followed that realisation died a swift death when her brain kicked into full gear, memories of ducking into a bar to escape James and his new girlfriend yesterday – she hoped it had been just yesterday because the other possibilities were a little too morbid to consider – returned and she finally took notice of her surroundings.

This was not her bed. Or even her apartment.

It wasn't even Alex's apartment.

And the handwriting on the note still in her hand was completely unrecognisable.

She had absolutely no idea where she was... and that was of course the exact moment she realised there was the sound of water running coming from behind the door close to the bedroom she was occupying.

As if on cue, the sound stopped, and it was with a growing sense of panic and dread that she turned to face the door just as it swung open to reveal none other than the cute bartender from yesterday.

Who happened to be shirtless.

She stared.

'Pretty fit-looking' had been a bit of an understatement; without the shirt to hide them, she could see his toned muscles and abs with perfect clarity... along with the smattering of hair on his chest and the dark trail that disappeared into the waistband of his jeans. Even with the slightly damp hair, he didn't have the gym bunny look that James had been extremely proud of but somehow she found what she was looking at right now to be vastly preferable. It communicated honest hard work and a healthy balanced diet, not protein shakes and testosterone-fuelled vanity.

Surprised staring evolved into straight-out ogling.

Then their eyes met and reality kicked Kara out of her stupor with sadistic glee.

“Hey, you're awake.” If he noticed that she had been blatantly eyeing him like he was a particularly juicy piece of meat, he didn't point it out and merely gave her that same warm smile from yesterday. (She really needed to check if she hadn't slept through a week or something because it sure felt like it.) “How are you feeling?”

“Uhhh...” she replied eloquently, her brain having overloaded and shut down on her.

His blue-grey eyes shifted to land on the glass she had put back down on the bedside table and he brightened just that little bit more. “Oh good, you drank it. That's my personal hangover cure recipe, by the way; I know the taste is practically a criminal offence in its own right but it gets the job done-”

“Where am I?” she squawked when she finally found her voice again.

He paused and looked at her with a mixture of curiosity and wariness. “My home. Which is right above the bar. That I own. I told you this yesterday.”

“Oh.” Okay. So she'd only slept through the night. A Friday night, thank goodness; at least she didn't have to worry about going into work late and getting fired.

It took several seconds for the full weight of his words to sink in.

She'd slept at his place... in his bed... after getting drunk... and he was coming out of his bathroom in the morning shirtless...

In the absence of clear memories, her mind immediately formed a picture she wasn't sure she liked.

His eyes widened in alarm as he seemingly realised what she was thinking and he held his hands up. “Okay, before you freak out you should know that absolutely nothing happened between us.”

“Then what did happen?” she demanded to know as she jumped to her feet, vaguely aware that she sounded somewhat hysterical.

He narrowed his eyes again. “...Before I answer that, what's the last thing you remember?”

“...Ordering a drink.” Which had been a terrible decision when she looked back at it now for a hundred reasons.

“Okay, well, I brought you what you asked for and... you kind of downed the rum I gave you in one go. And pretty much got completely smashed just like that.”

“Oh.” The floor was suddenly so very fascinating.

“After that, you ate all the food and asked for another drink.”

Fighting the urge to squirm was proving to be an ineffective means of distracting herself but it wasn't like she had a lot of options so she kept at it.

“I suggested you rest and sober up instead before I escorted you home but then you said you were still hungry. I decided more food couldn't hurt – might even help you sober up faster – but while I was busy cooking it, you stole a bottle of whiskey and had wiped out half its contents by the time I came back.”

She cringed and switched her focus to willing a hole to appear beneath her feet so she could disappear forever.

“Then you saw the food in my hands and... well... I have to say, you have one hell of an appetite for someone your size.”

Was there no end to her transgressions? If he didn't sound so serious – albeit a little amused – and she wasn't all too aware that she had an inhuman appetite when she was really hungry, she would've thought he was making it all up just to mess with her.

“Some of my staff had started coming in by then so I let them handle things while I took you upstairs and tried to help you sober up. You seemed fine after a while so I went back downstairs to tell them I was driving you home.” There was a dreaded pause. “Except you'd crawled into my bed and fallen fast asleep while I was gone. I didn't have the heart to wake you so I tucked you in and decided to just drive you home after you'd woken up on your own. I guess I just didn't expect you to take until the next morning to do it.”

It was at that point she finally noted that she was still fully dressed except for her shoes which had been placed neatly near the foot of the bed. His bed, to be precise. A quick glance in the direction of what was clearly the living room revealed the sight of a very comfortable couch... that had clearly served as someone's bed last night especially with the pillow and folded blanket resting on one seat. It didn't take a genius to deduce who its occupant had been.

I want to die, was all Kara could think in her mortified state.

She'd not only gotten drunk and eaten like a pig in front of a very sweet and cute – or rather hot – guy but also unwittingly kicked him out of his own bed and forced him to sleep on his couch when all he'd done was show her a level of kindness and hospitality that was almost extinct in the modern age.

It couldn't possibly get any worse than that.

“By the way, you're a very talkative drunk, if you must know. And I mean very.”

Maybe she could just throw herself out of the nearest window and put an end to her misery right this second.

Shuffling noises dragged her out of her suicidal state of mind to find that he'd fetched a shirt from somewhere while she wasn't paying attention and was in the process of getting dressed. (The small part of her brain driven entirely by hormones began mourning in earnest, causing her to mentally kick it with a vengeance.) “Anyway, that's the whole story,” he finished as he tucked his shirt in. “I know you might not believe me but-”

“N-No,” she stammered quickly, “I believe you. I mean...” She gestured vaguely at everything around them. “The evidence kind of speaks for itself. And... you don't look like the kind of guy who'd... you know.”

“I'll take that as a compliment,” he replied wryly. “Anyway, do you want breakfast before we go?”

“Go?” she squeaked, her panic levels rising again. “Go where?”

The corners of his lips twitched as if he was trying very hard not to laugh out loud. “Your home. You might feel fine now but more rest wouldn't hurt. I'm going to take a wild guess and say you don't drink very often, much less get hungover, so I think it's better if I drive you home. Someone should keep an eye on you and make sure you get home safely.”

Oh god, why couldn't he stop being so impossibly nice?! “I-It's fine!” Her voice nearly hit a glass-shattering pitch and she waved her hands frantically in front of her. “I-I mean, you've done so much for me already and I couldn't live with myself if I imposed on you even more.” And I mean that literally, she thought to herself as she bent down to blindly reach for her shoes and struggled to put them on. If she didn't flee this place within the next five minutes, she was either going to drop dead of humiliation or spontaneously combust based on how hot her face felt.

“Are you sure?” he asked sincerely. “It's not too much trouble for me, if that's what you're worried about.”

Even if that were true, she had a suspicion that spending any more time in his presence was just going to result in her making an even bigger fool of herself... if that was even possible. “Y-Yes! I'll be fine! Don't worry about me!”

His frown made it clear he didn't believe her but to her immense relief he decided not to push it. “...All right, but let me see you out at least. I mean, I have to since I have the key but you get what I mean.”

“Y-Yes, I do. Thank you. A-And sorry about... everything,” she finished lamely as she watched him unlock the door and lead her down a flight of stairs to yet another door.

He waved her apology away with one hand while his other unlocked the door and pushed it open to reveal a small alleyway that connected to the main street. “Don't worry about it. You need directions to the subway?”

“No,” she lied as she tried not to trip over her own feet in her haste to escape. “Like I said, I'll be fine. S-So, um... bye.”

With that, she turned and fled in what she was only half certain was the direction she'd come from yesterday, the sound of him wishing her a safe journey fading away behind her.

She was halfway home before she realised she didn't even know his name.

“Thank god!” Alex exclaimed the moment Kara walked into her apartment before she turned her attention back to the phone in her hand. “Eve, it's okay, she's home. Yeah, I know. I'll tell her and make sure she calls you after I'm through with her.” With that, she ended the call and strode over to wrap Kara in a bone-crushing hug. “Where have you been?! First you don't show up for our dinner date and then you don't answer your phone when I call! And I called like a hundred times! Do you have any idea how worried I was?! I was this close to calling my boss and asking him to let me use FBI resources to find you!”

“A-Alex...” Kara croaked weakly as the sound of her ribs possibly cracking reached her ears, “t-too tight...”

“What? Oh, sorry.” Releasing her favourite cousin almost immediately, Alex pulled away to check Kara from head to toe with furrowed brows. “But seriously, are you okay? I mean, you look fine... Well, sort of; you look like you haven't eaten anything for at least a day and it's already past noon. Have you had lunch? We can order take-out but you're lucky I brought some doughnuts with me when I came here to check on you so you can have those while we wait-”

Then Alex suddenly paused in the middle of her verbal barrage as she finally noted the state of Kara's clothes – clothes which Kara was starting to realise her cousin recognised as the outfit she had been wearing yesterday when they had met for breakfast. “Alex-” she started in a blind bid to stop the misunderstanding she knew was coming.

She was too late. “Wait a minute...” Alex trailed off, her expression changing first to confusion then realisation and finally something that could only be scandalised glee. “Kara Danvers, did you bail on me for a one night stand?!”

Kara cringed at the accusation and wished she could drop dead for what had to be at least the tenth time today. “W-What?!”

“And then you did the walk of shame home!” Alex crowed, entirely too enthusiastic about the (erroneous) conclusion she had drawn. “I never knew you had it in you! Oh my god, I have to tell Eve-”

“Nothing happened between us!” Kara cried desperately with tears in her eyes, unable to tolerate hearing another word about whatever torrid affair Alex was imagining.

Instead of being deterred or even disappointed, Alex widened her eyes and began grinning triumphantly. “Aha!” She took a step back so that she could point accusingly at Kara and almost stabbed her eye out in the process. “So there was a guy!”

Oh god, why couldn't today be over already?! “It's not what you think!”

“Is that so?” It could not be any more obvious that Alex didn't believe her. “Then surely you won't mind telling me what really happened?”

Faced with no other choice, Kara recounted everything that had happened starting from the moment she had gotten lost after locating the antiques shop while stuffing her face with doughnuts. (She made the strategic decision to leave out every occasion where she'd stared at her unlikely saviour especially the incident that had happened just that morning. Alex didn't need that kind of ammunition.)

“...So let me get this straight,” Alex began when Kara finally finished her story and busied herself with making a cup of coffee to wash down her small doughnut feast. “You imposed on this guy like crazy and he didn't kick you out of his place for it or even get mad. And then he prepared a hangover cure for you, offered to make you breakfast when you woke up and then wanted to drive you home.”

“Pretty much,” Kara mumbled into her cup. The trip down memory lane had not improved her mood and she wanted to be completely done with this whole fiasco already.

Instead of being satisfied, Alex stared at Kara as if she had suddenly declared she was pursuing a new career as a leotard-wearing crime-fighting vigilante. “And you didn't just jump him right then and there?”

The mouthful of coffee that Kara had just swallowed nearly came back out through her nose. “E-E-Excuse me?!” she finally managed to get out after a great deal of coughing.

Unmoved by Kara's suffering, Alex just looked at her cousin with an expression that could only be described as abject disappointment. “Look, I know you're a hopeless romantic and you're still all broken up about James – what happened yesterday is proof of that – but you need to get laid, Kara-”

“I DO NOT!” Kara protested hotly, her face burning to such an extent that steam would have been coming out of her ears if she was a cartoon character.

“-and this guy seems exactly like he's your type,” Alex continued while completely ignoring Kara's outburst. “I mean, based on what you said, that is; it's not like I've met him for myself. Plus, I'm guessing he's pretty good-looking, right?”

Unbidden, the crystal-clear memory of him shirtless that morning came rushing back to the front of her mind and caused her to turn an even darker shade of red.

Alex eyed Kara's flushed face and noted her continued silence. “That hot, huh?”

“I'm not answering that,” Kara mumbled.

A gusty sigh escaped Alex. “You really are a lost cause. Please tell me you at least got his number.”

Kara started silently counting the threads in her tablecloth.

“...Oh my god, Kara.”

“There was no reason to ask AND I WAS PANICKING! It wasn't exactly at the top of my list of priorities!”

“Well it should have been!” Alex suddenly paused as a thought occurred to her. “Wait a minute... The whole time you were telling me what happened... Do you even know his name?”

It was futile, but Kara began wishing she could just disappear from the face of the earth.

Alex threw her hands in the air. “That's it. I give up. You're going to be an unmarried crazy cat lady and I'll still love you anyway but you won't have anyone to blame for it but yourself.”

“W-Well maybe that's what I want,” Kara muttered defiantly even though she could not have sounded more unconvincing if she'd tried. Besides, she didn't see why Alex was so hung up about this guy (whose name she was sure he'd mentioned last night except she didn't remember anything about last night); okay, so he was nice and funny and also kind of really hot... but he was still just some random bartender she'd met completely by chance.

“Suit yourself,” Alex replied with a weary expression.

Kara bristled. “Even if I wanted to track him down for... whatever reason, I literally have no way to do it so please just drop it already.” It was true; there was absolutely zero chance she was ever going to run into him again, for one, and considering the fact that she didn't really remember where his bar was, there was no way for her to seek him out either. She was better off just putting the whole incident out of her mind and forgetting all about him.

“Fine. If you insist.”

“Thank you.”

A beat of silence followed before Alex spoke up again in a faux casual manner. “You know, I do work for the FBI...”

“Alex, NO.”

Despite her own convictions on the matter, Kara found herself trying anyway.

In her defence, it wasn't like she'd made a conscious decision to do it. Not at first anyway.

All she had wanted to do was find out exactly how much her little series of poor decisions had cost her – financially speaking, that is; pride-wise, she was completely bankrupt – so that she could make the necessary adjustments to her Christmas gift-shopping budget.

Except there were no records of any transactions on her credit card for that day.

And when she thought about it, her purse the morning after had contained roughly the same amount of money she remembered having that day.

There was only one conclusion to be drawn: He hadn't charged her for anything. Not the drinks, not the food... nothing.

She couldn't be sure, but she thought she might be starting to genuinely sort of hate him for being so mind-bogglingly nice that he was making it impossible to just forget about him.

Especially now that she knew she literally owed him for everything he had done for her that day.

However, that didn't change the fact that she still had the same problem as before; even if she wanted to find him in order to give him the money she owed him – and nothing more; that needed to be stressed –, she had no idea how to do it. If anything, the lack of a receipt or any other kind of financial record connecting her to his bar meant that she had even less to go on than she previously thought.

There really was nothing she could do to fix it, and the thought of being indebted to someone who had helped her so much when he could have just as easily let her be or even done worse felt like an itch she couldn't scratch.

It was... aggravating, to say the least.

But maybe not as aggravating as the fact that no matter how hard she tried, she still couldn't remember his name... and her traitorous brain had taken to simply calling him Hot Guy as a placeholder.

Perhaps the only silver lining to be found was that no one would know as long as she didn't blurt it out. Eve in particular would have a field day if she ever got wind of it; ever since they had become best friends in high school, the girl had a strange obsession with Kara's love life that still persisted until now. It was no surprise that after learning the whole story, she was even worse than Alex when it came to 'encouraging' Kara to find a way to track down Hot Guy.

(At least Sam stuck to bemused comments here and there although they unfortunately tended to be the type that only encouraged the other two women in their group. Winn, on the other hand, was of no help whatsoever since he always avoided girl talk gatherings by default for obvious reasons. When word of Hot Guy had spread throughout their little gang, he learned all too quickly to recognise the signs of an impending harassment session as Kara liked to call it and make himself scarce.)

Constant reminders that she had no way of achieving what they wanted her to do – barring offers of 'assistance' via the FBI from Alex which Kara firmly rejected – did not deter them.

In summary, it was almost impossible for her to just put the whole humiliating event behind her and move on with her mopey single life even though it had been slightly over a week since then.

Fortunately, her boss was all too happy to help her keep her mind off Hot Guy in his own way even though he was naturally unaware that she needed a distraction.

“Sap,” he grunted with his signature scowl as he tossed her a small folded piece of paper. “People want to read feel good stories for Christmas season so we have to deliver. The paediatric ward of Eden Valley Hospital is having a little early Christmas party for their patients – presents, a Santa, all the usual overly sentimental crap. Time and date's on that paper. Be there, get some details and write something short about it when you get back. They've hired their own photographer – some amateur freelancer – so you'll be on your own. And try not to embarrass us while you're there, Danvers.”

Trust Snapper to sneer even at something as pure as kids enjoying some festive cheer, she thought to herself as she noted when she had to be at the hospital. Oh well. At least it was a pretty straightforward assignment and something that she found personally appealing. Plus, spending time helping to bring Christmas cheer to children seemed like the perfect cure to her less than festive mood.

If she was really lucky, maybe the whole thing would help her finally stop thinking so much about Hot Guy at the same time.

Up above, whichever god it was that had it out for her began cackling evilly.

Understandably oblivious to said cackling, Kara made her way to Eden Valley Hospital on the appointed date armed only with her trusty notebook and her usual sunny smile. The kids she was going to meet were already in less than happy circumstances; they didn't need her being a wet blanket and ruining their day for them.

Consequently, she was completely at ease and was even humming lightly while she waited in the lobby just outside the paediatric ward of the hospital.

“Ho, ho, ho.”

She stopped humming and froze altogether. That voice.

“If I didn't know better, I'd say you were stalking me.”

It can't be. Ever so slowly, she turned around to face the source of the voice, praying all the while that she had misheard and the person who had spoke was not the last person possibly only second to James she wanted to meet.

As it turned out, the person standing behind her who had spoken was Santa Claus – most likely the one who had been hired or volunteered to entertain the kids.

With the costume complete with fake belly and voluminous white fake beard, it should have been impossible to identify the man wearing it... except this Santa had incredibly unique blue-grey eyes.

Eyes that were looking back at her with a mixture of recognition and surprised mirth.

Santa was Hot Guy.

Suddenly this assignment had lost all its appeal.

“Hi there.” The fake beard obscured most of his face but it was obvious he was grinning at her underneath it.

She made a gurgling sound that would only have been considered a greeting by some deep sea creature that had still been undiscovered by National Geographic.

“Yes, it's nice to see you again too,” he replied as if she had actually said something intelligible.

That was enough to get her brain and tongue working again although not by much. “Y-Y-You...! W-What're you doing here?”

One of his eyebrows arched – how he managed to make the action visible under his Santa hat she had no idea – and he raised his hands to gesture at his costume. “I think that's pretty obvious. And I think I can guess why you're here, Ms Hotshot Reporter.”

The nickname made her flush and once again wonder exactly what she'd babbled about while she had been drunk. “Don't call me that!” she hissed, only remembering at the last minute that they were in a hospital and to keep her voice down.

“Would you prefer Goldilocks instead?” he offered cheekily.

“Wha- No! And what's the justification for that anyway?!”

“Well, let's see...” He raised his hands and began ticking each point off on his gloved fingers. “First you barged into my place-”

“I distinctly recall you saying I could stay!”

“-then you ate my food-”

“You offered!”

“-and finally you slept in my bed.”

She opened her mouth, realised she had no counterargument for that and shut it again with a click.

It was clear he was one step shy of laughing out loud at her. “So no objections to Goldilocks then?”

“Of course I have objections!” Desperate to make him stop, she blurted out the first thing she could think of. “A-A-And I bet you're just using all these nicknames to hide the fact that you don't remember my name!”

“Oh no,” he cheerfully and mercilessly destroyed her accusation in one fell swoop. “I remember your name very well, Kara Danvers. In fact, I remember everything you told me that day. And I do mean 'everything'.” He cocked his head to the side as a thought occurred to him and his grin got impossibly wider. “Wait a minute... If you're accusing me of forgetting, could it be that you still don't remember anything from that day? Including my name?”

“O-O-Of course I remember!” she lied, feeling her face get even hotter than before.

He took a step closer, and she would have taken a reactionary step backwards if panic had not nailed her feet to the floor. “You know you get this little...” he pointed at the space between his own eyes as he lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, “this little crinkle right up there when you lie?”

Panic turned to horror as she instinctively smacked her free hand over said traitorous telltale crinkle. How does he know about that?! This is only the second time we've met!

“Is everything all right here?”

The unexpected third voice burst the little bubble the two of them had been occupying for the last who knew how many minutes, causing Kara to jump like a spooked gazelle and squeak in surprise. As one, they turned to find a female nurse with staring at them with a mixture of concern and curiosity.

“Everything's fine,” Hot Guy answered, a hint of a laugh still lingering in his voice while Kara kept her mouth shut out of embarrassment. “We've met before and were just a little surprised to run each other here, that's all.”

“I see...” Despite his reassurances, the nurse still didn't quite look convinced but decided it wasn't worth fussing over and gestured for them to follow her. “Well, come along if you're both ready. All the kids are waiting and if we don't start soon I think we'll have a riot on our hands.”

Eager to escape before things got even more embarrassing for her, Kara scuttled past the source of her recent troubles and refused to acknowledge him even as she heard him fall in step behind her. The knowledge that he was most likely still grinning away at her back made her keep her eyes firmly forward and she kept it up all the way until they entered the paediatric ward.

Thankfully, he chose not to keep teasing her and went to 'work' the moment he popped inside the play area inside the ward where the early Christmas party was being held. He played his part with great gusto, at times behaving more like a kid himself as he joked around with the kids and told the most atrocious puns that made them and even the hospital staff present groan or burst into loud fits of laughter. (She tried not to think too much about how good he was with kids and what that might mean in the context of a relationship.)

Put at ease by the light-hearted atmosphere, Kara found herself starting to relax and even possibly enjoying herself as she forgot about her many and still unresolved issues with Hot Guy Who She Was Most Adamantly Not Going to Refer to as Hot Santa.

Of course, it was when she had completely lowered her guard that the universe decided to ruin her life once more.

The presents had been brought out and the kids were taking their turn sitting on Santa's lap when Kara felt someone tug at her pants. Looking down, she found one of the girls – Leanne, if she remembered correctly – staring up at her with a curious look on her face. “Are you getting a present too?” the girl asked innocently, her hand still clutching a fistful of Kara's pants.

“Oh no, the presents are just for all of you,” Kara explained with a gentle smile, secretly touched by the girl's thoughtfulness. “I don't need one, really.”

Leanne frowned. “But everyone here should have presents.” Then her face lit up and she bounced on her feet so much that her sandy brown locks seemed to imitate little wings. “You should ask Santa! Maybe he brought a present for you too and you just don't know it!”

Kara's smile froze on her face as her brain shut down on her. “W-W-What?”

“Yeah!” Having overheard the conversation, a boy whose name Kara was vaguely sure was Val bounded over and grabbed one of her hands so that he could drag her in the direction of Hot Guy Dressed as Santa. “Come on! Let's go ask him!”

“N-No, wait! I-It's fine!” Kara tried to dissuade them even as she mentally scrambled for a way out of this mess to no avail. Being a child only slightly over the age of ten, Val wasn't strong and didn't exactly have a very tight grip but she wasn't about to violently wrench her hand free either and potentially upset or even hurt him. “I mean it! I don't need a-”

In her distracted and panicked state, she turned to try and look to one of the nurses present for help but failed to pay attention to her surroundings. The sensation of her heel hitting something hard caused her to lose her balance, cutting off the rest of her sentence and replacing it with a muted shriek. Time slowed to a crawl as gravity kicked in and she pitched backwards with her arms flailing wildly in the air.

Just as she was sure she was going to painfully hit the ground, however, her butt landed on something relatively soft and she instinctively wrapped her arms around the closest thing within reach for support. At the same time, she felt someone wrap their own arms around her waist to further keep her steady.

Heart hammering away in her chest, it took her far too long to realise that the soft thing she was sitting on was someone's lap... and that same someone was also the person she was clinging to for dear life... and the same someone who was also steadying her with a firm grip around her waist.

The sensation of her cheek being tickled by the cottony material of a voluminous fake beard made it impossible to mistake the identity of her saviour.

“Look, look!” one of the other girls cried out. “She's as red as Santa's suit!”

Amidst the howling and giggling around her and feeling him shake with suppressed laughter thanks to their proximity, Kara found herself liking children a lot less than she did a mere several hours ago.

“It's fate,” Eve declared with unwavering conviction when Kara finished recounting her latest humiliating encounter with Hot Guy to her group of friends sans Winn who had conveniently been unavailable again. (If she heavily embellished her story and left out the part where she'd fled the scene as soon as the party was over without saying another word to him and left her dignity lying on a slab in the hospital morgue, no one present would know.)

“No it's not!” Despite her best efforts to sound forceful, Kara still sounded far too petulant even for her own ears. Knowing that convincing Eve otherwise by herself was a lost cause, she turned to Sam for help, silently thankful that they had gathered in Alex's apartment instead of a public place so there was no one to overhear her. “Sam, please. Help me out here.”

The amused gleam in Sam's eyes gave Kara little hope that she would get what she wanted. “Well, maybe 'fate' is a little strong but you have to admit it's too much of a coincidence that you ran into him again... and in the most unexpected place at that.”

“Give it up, Kara; you're still outnumbered on this issue and you always will be.” Far from being the loving and supportive cousin that she always was, Alex responded to Kara's misery with smug fiendishness. “My offer from before still stands so-”

“For the last time, I am not going to ask you to track him down!” Kara cut her cousin off, the heat in her voice only matched by the heat burning her cheeks.

“But you still owe him for the drinks and food you had, don't you?” Eve pounced with a predatory gleam in her eyes. “Are you telling me that Ms Kara 'Goody Two Shoes' Danvers is the kind of person to pull a dine and dash? Why, it's like I never knew you at all!”

“Yeah, think about how this reflects on your parents, Kara,” Alex piled on, grinning from ear to ear. “What am I going to say when Aunt Alura and Uncle Sorrel ask me how you've been during the Christmas party?”

Kara sputtered incoherently for nearly half a minute before she regained her ability to speak. “You are not telling my parents about any of this, you hear me?!”

“It's okay, Kara, I promise to stop Alex – and Eve too for that matter – from sharing any of this during the Christmas party,” Sam quickly cut in soothingly as she put a hand on Alex's arm. “But Kara... As much as you don't want to hear it, you do have unfinished business with this guy that you have to settle one way or another. I'm not going to tell you how; that's up to you. Whether all you do is pay him what you owe him or more-”

“More!” Eve and Alex chorused before giving each other a high five, causing both Sam and Kara to glare reproachfully at them.

“However you choose to handle the situation,” Sam continued pointedly, “you should face it – or rather him – for good or you probably won't be able to really move on with your life. We haven't known each other for that long but I think I know you well enough to safely say that leaving things like this doesn't sit well with you either. So do it for yourself. Okay?”

“...Okay,” Kara finally replied with a gusty sigh.

Sam smiled and reached out with the hand not still resting on Alex's arm to rub Kara's shoulder comfortingly. “Good. Now I don't want to upset you any further but I have to ask...”

Dread crept up on Kara at the hesitation in Sam's voice and expression. “...What is it?”

“You said there was a photographer at the event so... Are there any pictures you should be worried about floating around or...?”

Kara's mind went blank. Beside her, Eve and Alex perked up like dogs that had just spotted a big juicy bone.

“...You totally forgot about that, didn't you?” Sam said as she watched the blood drain from Kara's face.

Amidst intense badgering by her best friend and favourite cousin to hunt down the photographer for potential incriminating pictures, Kara dropped her head onto the table and began earnestly banging it on the hardwood surface in the faint hopes of falling into a coma.

She had done it. She had finally managed to locate the bar.

Now all she had to do was go inside and confront the guy who owned it.

Kara stared at the door separating her from her goal and took a fortifying breath before decisively pushing it open and stepping inside.

Just as she had expected, she found him standing behind the bar cleaning a glass and humming some tune she vaguely recognised.

The way he smiled when he looked up from his task and recognised her made her stomach flip-flop. “Well, look who literally just walked in. I have to say this is a big surprise considering how our last meeting ended.”

“I had to see you again,” she confessed as she slowly approached him, her confidence growing inversely with the disappearing distance between them.

He raised an eyebrow and put the glass in his hands down. “Is that so?”

“Yes.” Instead of stopping when the bar was within reach, she continued until she was behind it and only empty space separated him from her.

“And why is that?” he asked, leaning casually on the bar as he intently watched her approach.

By that point, she was standing right in front of him – so close that she could almost feel the warmth of his body. “Because...” She licked her lips and felt a thrill run through her body when the simple act caught his gaze and held it. “There's something I've been meaning to do for quite some time.”

Then she reached out to grab fistfuls of his shirt and pull him down so that she could crash her lips against his.

He growled into her mouth as he deepened the kiss, causing her to let out a muffled moan in response, and used the extremely pleasurable distraction to wrap his hands around her waist and lift her up onto the bar-

Kara jerked awake at the shrill sound of her alarm clock rudely telling her it was time to get up.

Disorientated with her limbs tangled up in her sheets and her entire body feeling like it was burning from the inside, she stared blankly at the ceiling of her bedroom as her brain endeavoured to make sense of what had just happened.

When she finally realised it had been nothing more than a dream, she groaned out loud and dragged a hand down her still flushed face.

“Goddamnit, not AGAIN.”

Slightly less than two weeks since that first Incident in the bar, Kara finally gave up and admitted a harsh truth she had been trying so hard to deny:

She liked Hot Guy.

Maybe even a little – or a lot – more than 'liked'.

Alex had been right, as much as it irked Kara how her cousin had behaved when she had pointed it out; he was the kind of guy she could definitely see herself dating on a long-term basis. He was sweet, kind, funny, charming...

...and she obviously found him very, very attractive if her highly inappropriate dreams about him were any indication.

(Although she did wish he didn't seemingly enjoy teasing her quite so much.)

It was strange to think that she had ever been hung up about James or even that she had been so ecstatic about being together with him in the first place; now, the thought of her ex-boyfriend no longer made her feel like she wanted to cry into a giant tub of salted caramel ice cream as she watched sappy romantic comedies... if she even thought about him at all.

Instead, her thoughts were mostly about Hot Guy – a fact made even more mortifying by the reality that both of their encounters had involved her doing something so utterly humiliating that she didn't think she could ever face him again.

What kind of impression she'd left on him each time was something she didn't like to think about too much. Or at all.

And that was the crux of her dilemma when it came to following Sam's advice: As much as she liked the idea of seeing him again and hopefully having something resembling a normal conversation with him where she didn't make an utter fool of herself, her chances of accomplishing just that appeared depressingly bleak. If anything, she was convinced that the universe had nominated her its favourite cosmic plaything and had only introduced Hot Guy into her life to torment her. Hoping for anything positive to come out of this whole fiasco seemed like a pipe dream at best.

Still... It was a nice dream and there was no harm in dreaming, right?

Such was her state of mind as she wandered around the mall looking for the perfect Christmas gifts for her family and friends. A sudden deluge of assignments at work had cost her precious weekends leading up to the big day, resulting in a frantic last-minute round of shopping on her part. To make matters worse, the shopping mall closest to her apartment had run out of stock of some of her top choices, forcing her to drive further away from the city centre in an effort to find what she was looking for somewhere else.

She was halfway through a silent prayer that the toy department would still have the Nerf gun she wanted to get Winn when she turned the corner in a hurry and crashed headlong into someone.

“Whoa!” Strong hands gripped her arms to steady her as she tried to blink away her disorientation. “Are you-”

Her brain rebooted and finally registered the face she was looking at as well as the voice that had spoken.

Of course.

It just had to be Hot Guy. Again. Except he was wearing glasses this time... and if she was being honest with herself, he looked really cute – unfairly so – with them on.

He recovered from his surprise first, and that now familiar grin of his curved his lips as he regarded her with undisguised amusement. “Okay, now I definitely have to ask if you're stalking me.”

In contrast, her brain had shut down again and her mouth just kept opening and closing without making a single sound.

“I guess I can now honestly say that I'm capable of leaving people speechless,” he joked. “Seriously though, are you okay?”

Kara nodded vigorously. “I-I-I... I-I'm fine. Um.” Heat flooded her cheeks when she realised he was still holding her. “Y-You... Y-You can let go now.”

When he did so and stepped back, she almost regretted it. “All right then. Well, I'm going to guess that you're getting some last-minute Christmas shopping in so I'll leave you to it.”

The sight of him moving to walk past her kick-started her still sluggish brain and she reached out to grab his hand and stop him before she could think twice. “W-Wait!”

He stilled and turned back to look at her curiously. “Yes?”

“Um.” Letting his hand go as her blush intensified, she mentally scrambled for something to say. She'd had a small speech of sorts prepared for whenever she happened to run into him again but now that she had, it had vanished like ether. This was her chance and she hadn't done anything embarrassing – yet, at least – but here she was squandering it away. Growing more and more desperate by the second, she blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “How much do I owe you?”

It was his turn to blink at her. “Sorry, what?”

“The-” She cleared her throat and started over. “I found out after I got home – well, later, but that's not the point – that you, um... You didn't charge me for the food and the drinks I ordered.” Or, in the case of the whiskey, basically stole. But she wasn't about to say that out loud. “I'd like to... well, pay that bill now."

“Oh, that.” He waved it away with an easy smile. “Don't worry about it. Consider it on the house.”

She shook her head. “N-No. Please, I insist.”

The corners of his lips twitched, and that was the only warning she got for what was about to happen next. “Even if I tell you that you owe me ten thousand dollars?”

And just like that, she was reduced to a sputtering mess. “W-W-What?!”

“Mhm.” He nodded sagely but it was obvious he was struggling to keep himself from laughing out loud at her. “You see, the rum I gave you wasn't just any normal rum; it was alien rum. Aldebaran rum, to be precise. That one shot alone cost a thousand dollars. As for the food-”

“You're just making all this up!” she raged with one finger pointed at the spot right between his eyes. “There's no way you have something like alien rum!”

The sound of someone loudly clearing their throat interrupted their conversation, and they turned to find an elderly woman glaring at them. “Some of us would like to do our shopping in peace, if you don't mind.”

“Sorry, ma'am,” he apologised to her with a sunny smile on their behalf while Kara tried to make herself as small as possible.

His apology, however, was not particularly well received if the way the old lady's scowl remained firmly in place was any indication. “Kids these days...” she muttered, throwing them disapproving looks as she slowly walked away to resume her shopping.

Kara felt her cheeks burn even hotter while Hot Guy suppressed a snicker. So much for not making a fool of herself this round.

“Back to the topic...” The sound of Hot Guy's voice dragged her attention back up to his grinning face. “Look, bottom line is I don't want your money. Consider it... an early Christmas gift, if you will.”

“B-But I...” A radical idea sprung to mind out of the blue and she found herself voicing it before she could reconsider what she was about to do. “What if I pay you back another way?”

Surprised, he cocked his head to the side and gave her a curious look. (A voice at the back of her mind noted that it made him look like a puppy.) “Meaning...?”

The panicking part of her screamed at her to back out now before she embarrassed herself any further but she summoned every scrap of courage she had and ploughed forward. “I, um... Are you doing anything on Christmas?”

Hints of his smile from earlier returned. “Well, I have a bar, if you remember, and Christmas is kind of one of the busiest times of the year for businesses like mine...”

“Oh. Right.” She tried not to sound as disheartened as she felt. “Um, never-”

“But you know,” he cut her off, “I am the boss so I can give myself the day off if I want. My staff can handle things and call me if they need anything. Anyway, what did you have in mind?”

Hope flared in her chest but she struggled to keep it under control. “S-So, um... I'm having a Christmas party with my family and friends and... you could come if you want?”

His eyes widened in surprise. “So you remember what happened that day?”

Her smile evaporated. “I'm sorry?”

“Oh. So you don't remember.” He coughed awkwardly, and she had a sinking feeling it was on her behalf. “Well... You, uh... kind of invited me to your Christmas party at one point while you were... you know.”

She paled. “...I did?”

The next four words out of his mouth explained why he was being so awkward. “As your fake boyfriend.”

...I wish I was dead, was all her brain could afford to muster in its horrified state.

“I said yes, by the way.”

His quiet confession drew her out of her misery whereupon she found him looking off to the side, a faint blush dusting his cheeks and his right hand scratching his jaw. If she didn't know better, she would've thought he was... nervous. “W-What? I-I... But why?”

He still wouldn't look at her. “You were telling me about how everyone at your party was going to be with someone they loved while you were all alone and... You looked so sad and your eyes were insanely blue.” Then he seemed to catch himself and cleared his throat. “I mean, they are blue, of course, but... in that moment, they were like... comets.” He met her gaze again, and the way he looked at her made her heart stutter. “It was kind of hard to say no to you when you were like that.”

If she hadn't already admitted to herself that she liked him before this, she was very sure that his speech would've made her mind up for her. “S-So... um... Does... Does that answer still apply?” she asked hesitantly.

That grin of his returned, and maybe it was her imagination but it seemed a little on the shy side. “If the offer still stands, yes.”

“G-Great!” If she smiled any wider, she was almost sure she was going to pull a muscle. “In that case, let me give you my address-”

“Oh, I have that already,” he interrupted her with a cheeky wink. “You gave it to me the first time you asked. On that note, you really should think twice before you invite strangers over to your place. And I bet you still don't remember my name so I'm pretty sure I still technically count as one.”

With a laugh and another wink, he departed, and she was once again left an embarrassed wreck in the wake of an encounter with him. To top things off, she had missed the golden opportunity to ask him for his name and was thus still forced to mentally refer to him as Hot Guy.

At least she had a reason or two to look forward to their next meeting.

Or maybe not, depending on how it would turn out.

I will not freak out. I will not screw this up. I will not freak out. I will not screw this up. I will not freak out. I will not screw this up. I will not-

“I still can't believe you actually invited him,” Eve commented between sips of eggnog. “I mean, I'm really proud of you, don't get me wrong, but I honestly didn't think you had it in you to be so bold.”

“Well I'm not going to believe it until he actually walks through that door.” Alex's entire demeanour made Kara feel like she was a murder suspect in a FBI interrogation room.

“And I still think you're all making this up as some weird prank on me,” Winn added his own two cents to the discussion before being distracted by an incoming message on his phone.

Kara glowered at all of them and debated finding a new group of friends. “I hate you all.”

“Now, now.” Once again, Sam came to Kara's rescue and gave the rest of the group chastising looks. “I'm sure he's going to show up and he's going to be everything you told us and more.” She chanced a glance at the clock. “What time did you tell him to show up though? Everyone's here already.”

Sam's innocent question caused Kara's heart to sink a little. “Same time as everyone else. I think. B-But maybe there's something he had to do at the bar first. That's why he's late,” she guessed out loud although she wondered whether she was trying to convince them or herself.

As if on cue, there was a knocking at her front door and her spirits immediately lifted.

“That must be him.” Okay, deep breaths, Kara, she told herself as she woodenly moved towards the door, all the while pointedly ignoring the 'encouragement' being thrown at her back and the curious stares of her parents, Aunt Eliza and Uncle Jeremiah. Just open the door, use the opportunity to ask him for his name and then invite him in so that you can introduce him to everyone properly. You'll figure out the rest after you make sure you don't screw that part up first.

Feeling about as confident as she could possibly be, she unlocked her front door and swung it open to reveal none other than Hot Sort-Of Fake Boyfriend Guy in all his hot and cute glory.

“Hi.” She couldn't help the nervous smile etched on her face. “You made it.”

“Well, I did promise to come,” he replied with his usual easy smile.

They both stood there for an indeterminate amount of time without saying anything else.

“...So are you going to let me in or did your invite only extend to your doorstep?” he asked cheekily.

His teasing made her flush like always but this time, she decided to stand her ground. This time, she was going to get his name and remember it. “Well, you did point out that I shouldn't invite strangers to my place and you're still a stranger as long as I don't know your name so...”

“Oh, so that's how you want to play it?” Those blue-grey orbs sparkled with amusement and she felt her heart stutter at the sight. “Fine then. My name is-”

“Mike?!”

Winn's surprised exclamation startled the both of them, and Kara turned on her heels to find her friend staring at Hot Guy with shocked recognition plastered all over his face. “Winn, you know him?”

“He's my old college buddy. We lost touch when I moved to National City and he had to go help his parents with their business in Gotham.” By the time he had finished his explanation, Winn had recovered from his surprise and practically leapt over to envelop Hot Guy Whose Name Was Apparently Mike in a bear hug. “Dude! I can't believe this! When did you come to National City?! Why didn't you call?!”

“Whoa, easy,” Mike laughed as he returned the hug. “One question at a time. We've got a lot of catching up to do, I know.”

Feeling all of a sudden like she was the third wheel in the situation, Kara could only watch on as she struggled to make sense of everything. Mike didn't look at all surprised to see Winn... which meant that he'd known to expect his old friend to be present at the party. But that made sense when she thought about it; after all, if she really had spilled her guts to him while she'd been drunk, there was no way she wouldn't have mentioned Winn in some capacity. Depending on how much she'd shared, it likely wouldn't have taken him all that long to put two and two together.

Suddenly she found herself doubting that she had been the reason he'd accepted her invitation so easily.

The moment was swiftly brought to an end when Sam came into view and unceremoniously pulled Winn away just as Kara felt someone shove her in the back with enough force to send her stumbling into Mike's arms. Taken completely unawares by the unexpected turn of events, she didn't figure out what was in store until it was too late.

“Hey everyone!” Alex's gleeful voice filled Kara with dread, and she looked up from her already embarrassing state of being in Mike's embrace to find her cousin holding a stick with a sprig of mistletoe dangling from one end above their heads. “Look who's under the mistletoe!”

“A-Alex, please...” Caught flat-footed on more than one level, Kara found herself wishing she was anywhere else as she put some suddenly much-needed distance between herself and Mike. “L-Let's not-”

“Kiss!” Eve who had most likely been the one to shove Kara began chanting, and all too soon everyone – even at least one of the older Danvers family members present – was chanting along as well. “Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!”

Illogical panic overrode everything else as Kara struggled to figure out a way to escape her current predicament. “Guys, I really don't want to do this-”

The sensation of a hand resting on her shoulder nearly made her jump a foot in the air, and she turned to find Mike giving everyone else that charming smile of his. “I know I'm the new guy here but can I ask for a free pass this time if that's all right with all of you? I'd rather not get on the host's bad side from the start.”

It was the rescue she so desperately wanted but somehow Kara didn't feel all that happy about it.

“Let them be, Alex.” Eliza stepped in with Alura close behind, the admonishing mother expression on both their faces all too familiar to Kara. “Kara's very obviously uncomfortable and this is supposed to be a happy occasion. And no, pouting to get your way hasn't worked since you were five and it certainly isn't going to work now. Come on, everyone; let's give Mike a nice welcome and have some more food.”

Loud groaning and complaining followed but eventually everyone obeyed and the festive mood from earlier was restored for the most part. Unsurprisingly, Mike fit into the group seamlessly thanks to his natural charm and good humour which won over even Alex in the blink of an eye. (Alura and Eliza seemed particularly fond of him – something which Kara didn't know how to feel about.) Curious about his connection to her boyfriend, Eve had wasted no time interrogating both men about their past and the stories they told were both revealing and entertaining.

Everything from Mike's upbringing up to the success of his parents' business allowing him to pursue his dream of owning his own bar elsewhere came out, filling in all the blanks in the picture Kara had already painted of him in her head.

She was finally getting to know him better just like she had been planning to do during this Christmas party... but she was finding it incredibly hard to actually enjoy it.

Mostly because throughout the entire time he was regaling his captive audience with his stories and jokes, he never once addressed her and barely even looked in her direction. In fact, he behaved as if he was Winn's guest instead of hers and she was just another new acquaintance like everyone else.

To make matters worse, she could feel eyes staring at her with what she was sure was far too much sympathy for her liking.

Moping over being single while still nursing a broken heart courtesy of James would have been more tolerable than this.

Just as Kara thought her mood couldn't worsen any further, Eve and Alex cornered her when had she excused herself for the hundredth time to refill her plate or drink just to get away from the group. “Whatever it is you want to say, I don't feel like hearing it,” she told them flatly with an unmistakable edge in her voice.

If Eve had been taken aback by the uncharacteristic bitterness coming from her best friend, she didn't show it. “You need to talk to him. And I mean properly.”

A little more frustrated than before, Kara angrily waved her hand in Mike's direction just as another burst of laughter reached their ears. “Yes, because that's totally possible with all that happening.”

“You leave that to us,” Alex chimed in. “All you need to worry about is pulling him to the side when we do our part.” Her gaze sharpened. “Or are you telling me you're fine with leaving things like this?”

Despite everything, there was a part of Kara that still clung to hope. “...Fine.”

As one, Eve and Alex beamed and pulled her in for a hug. “Good. Give us a couple of minutes to distract everyone and then move in. And in case it wasn't clear, we're rooting for you.”

With that, Kara was left alone again, and she watched silently as her best friend and cousin worked in tandem with Sam to stealthily occupy everyone except Mike, creating the promised window of opportunity in the process.

This was it – her possibly last chance to act... or give up forever.

She swallowed and forced herself to move until she was close enough to get his attention with a gentle touch on his arm. “C-Can I... speak to you? In private?” she asked, making sure to keep her voice down so that as few people as possible overheard her.

A flicker of surprise crossed his face but it disappeared as quickly as it had appeared. “Sure. Where to?”

Her first thought was her bedroom but she dismissed it immediately; considering the size of her apartment, there was no doubt everyone would be able to eavesdrop on their conversation with minimal effort if they talked there. That left only one feasible option. “Let's step outside for a bit?”

“All right.” He got up and gestured towards the front door. “Lead the way.”

When she had agreed to go along with all this, she had already started trying to figure out what she was going to say to him when they were alone. What worked in her favour was the fact that she had sort of prepared something in the days leading up to the Christmas party so she wasn't flying blind. On the other hand, she had been expecting to be in a much more positive state of mind when she had this conversation with him...

Anxious and teetering on the edge of losing hope entirely, she therefore proceeded to completely mess things up for herself the moment the front door clicked shut.

“Do you like me?” she blurted out before she could stop herself.

He froze and stared blankly at her for a moment before he recovered and gave her a teasing smile that just seemed a little off. “Of course I like you. Well, when you're not doing something like suspect me of taking advantage of you while you're drunk at least.”

Was he being obtuse on purpose? She couldn't be sure but the possibility alone was enough to make her irritation overcome her nervousness. “No, I mean do you 'like me' like me?”

His smile faded much to her regret and he gave her an unreadable look. “Can I ask why you're asking me this?”

She had told herself she was going to be calm and composed when she broached the subject but something about the way he'd asked that question caused the dam to break. “I- It's just- You've been giving me a lot of mixed signals, okay? First you're so unbelievably nice even when we've only just met which- okay, that's not a fair point to bring up but- But then you keep being so nice and you won't let me pay you back and then you say yes when I invite you to my party – this party – but you show up and I find out that you know Winn and you must've known he was going to be here because I would've definitely mentioned him at some point while I was drunk so I started to wonder if maybe you'd just agreed to come so you could see him and-” The next part came out in a pained rush before she could think twice. “And then you didn't want to kiss me.”

The way he slowly blinked at her made it clear her verbal bombardment had been a bit much for him but he recovered eventually and mystifyingly enough started frowning incredulously at her. “I didn't want to kiss you? You made it clear you didn't want to kiss me!”

Thrown by his accusation, she had to take a moment to formulate a response, however weak it might be. “W-What?! When did I do that?!”

“You freaked out when Alex waved that mistletoe over us! If you'd moved any faster to put some distance between us when she did that, you would've broken the sound barrier!”

“That was because I thought you'd come to the party because of Winn instead of me!”

“Why would you even think that?! It's not like I knew for sure the Winn you were friends with was the same Winn I was friends with back in college!”

“Winn's not exactly a common name!”

“It's certainly not one-of-a-kind either!”

“That still doesn't explain why you just ignored me after that! You didn't even bring it up just so you could tease me about it!”

“Wait, stop.” He held his hand palm up as he eyed her with a mixture of bafflement and wariness. “Are you... Are you saying you did want to kiss me then?”

She flushed as her embarrassment overrode her (in hindsight comically) manic anger from earlier. “I-I-I mean... I'm not saying I didn't...”

Those blue-grey orbs all but lit up as that now all too familiar teasing grin curved his lips. “So you did want to kiss me.”

Damn him. Why could she never win against him? “W-W-Well, what about you? Did you want to... to k-kiss me?”

He took a sudden step closer to her, and the light in his eyes changed to a dangerous gleam that made her heart race uncontrollably. “Did. Still do.”

“O-Oh?” she stuttered, feeling her body lean in as if of its own will.

“So?” He was so close she could feel his breath wash over her face. “What about you?”

“W-Well...” She swallowed in an effort to fix her suddenly dry throat. “We were under the mistletoe...”

“That we were,” he lazily agreed.

Gentleman that he was, he gave her one last chance to back out before he leaned in.

She met him halfway.

The kiss started soft and sweet before one of them dared to take it a step further, and then all her brain could register was heat and passion as she felt his hands cradle her face while she reached out to curl her fingers around the fabric of his shirt-

They jerked apart when the front door swung open without warning and they both turned just in time to be blinded by the flash of several cameras going off in quick succession.

“I KNEW IT!” Eve crowed triumphantly as she proceeded to snap even more photos much to Kara's growing horror. “I KNEW ALL YOU NEEDED WAS A PUSH!”

Holding on to his girlfriend to make sure she didn't fall over in her excitement, Winn flashed Mike a huge grin and a thumbs up. “Good luck, buddy; you have no idea what you just got yourself into.”

“Bold move, kissing my daughter in front of me,” Sorrel commented in his best attempt at playing a disapproving father. “If you break her heart, you'll have to answer to me.”

“And me,” Jeremiah added, prompting Eliza to smack his arm just as Alura did the same to her own husband.

“Get in line, you two! I got first dibs!” Alex yelled back at both men before turning back around to mouth 'Good job!' to Kara with a rather demented smile on her face.

Kara was distracted from her fervent wishes for the ground to open up beneath her by the sensation of an arm wrapping around her waist and pulling her close. “Got any regrets now?” Mike whispered into her hair.

His tone was mostly teasing, but she could detect a hint of shy uncertainty lurking underneath. It was enough for her. “...No,” she whispered back, smothering a timid smile into his chest.

“All right, everyone leave my daughter alone before she decides to disown all of us,” Alura playfully scolded everyone as she pushed her way to the front to face Kara and Mike with a warm smile on her face. “I'm happy for the two of you and I wish you both many happy days ahead together.”

“Thanks, Mom,” Kara mumbled.

“Thank you, Mrs Danvers,” Mike followed up sincerely.

“Please, call me Alura; otherwise Eliza and I are going to keep being confused about who you're addressing.” Then she winked. “Or Mom if you prefer that.”

Kara's fading blush flared back to life with the strength of ten suns. “M-M-MOM!”

Despite the fact that a large share of the laughter around her was at her expense, Kara still thought this was one of her favourite Christmases ever. It only got better when the rest of the night involved the two of them making plans for their first official date and putting in only a token amount of effort to avoid the mistletoe every time Alex and Eve started waving it over their heads.

(The next time she ended up in his bed, she was quite sober, very much naked and most definitely not alone.)

(She also gladly let him make her breakfast the next morning.)