Chapter Text
It happens so fast. I hope this isn’t the last time we talk, Lena says, and before she can think better of it, they’ve got standing lunch dates and watch movies cuddled under blankets and she’s a regular at game night.
Kara takes the fortress she’s spent years constructing around herself and flies right in like there’s nothing even there. Like those walls meant to keep people out don’t exist. Lena’s left reeling, head spinning trying to keep up.
She spends the first few months so utterly confused by Kara’s presence that it’s a miracle she realizes at all that she’s falling in love. And sometimes it feels like Kara’s right there falling with her as they build a friendship that feels more like a romance.
They go out to eat and Kara pulls out her chair. She holds doors open and guides Lena with a feather-light touch on the small of her back. They hold hands when they walk down the street and Kara blushes when Lena presses a kiss to her cheek, sometimes a little too close to her lips.
She finds herself spending the night at Kara’s more often than not, her clothes making their way into the closet and drawers and a toothbrush appearing on the counter by the sink. She falls asleep most nights with Kara pressed against her back, an arm around her waist, and wakes up practically pinned to the bed, Kara draped over her and breathing slow and warm against the bare skin of her neck.
Lena feels loved in a way she has never felt before.
As time goes on, people start assuming more and more that they’re a couple, and the line they’re walking blurs even further.
At Noonan’s, they bicker about Lena paying for everything (as they walk away, Kara grumbles about superspeed being useless if she can’t even get her wallet out in time to pay for breakfast), and the barista tells them how cute they are together.
The woman who runs the baked goods stall at the farmer’s market on Saturdays shows them pictures of her goats and tells Kara and Lena that they remind her of her and her wife when they were young. Glowingly in love, she says, and they laugh but they don’t correct her. They never correct anyone.
Even as they walk away, hands clasped and a flower Kara bought for seventy-five cents from a vendor several stalls back tucked behind Lena’s ear, they laugh but never outright deny it to each other. Lena’s not sure she could get the words out if she tried.
It happens all the time. Everywhere they go. Still, they never address it. They keep on as they are—lunch dates and watching movies cuddled under blankets and coming home to each other every night. They eat dinner together and Kara hinders breakfast by draping her body over Lena’s back as she tries to make enough to sate a Kryptonian appetite.
Lena is dizzyingly in love and has no idea what they’re doing. Kara smiles at her like the whole world narrows down to just them when she does, and still, they never address it.
The tipping point comes when they meet Kelly. Everyone spends a few weeks pestering Alex to bring her to game night so they can properly meet her, and eventually she gives in.
And Kelly is great. Of all the Superfriends, she’s easily the most laid-back, and she wins instant points in Lena’s eyes for not tackling anyone to the ground when she loses the first round of Uno. (Unlike Alex or Kara, who accuse each other of cheating more than they actually play the game.)
Lena appreciates how calm she is in the midst of the madness, and tries to engage her in conversation between games or while they bide time waiting for Kara and Alex to stop arguing over whether lead-lined cards are really necessary.
“Lena,” Kara says, her voice close to Lena’s ear. But she’s having a fascinating conversation with Kelly about how different her job is as a social worker now that she’s mostly working with alien children, so she ignores Kara.
“Leeennaa,” Kara tries again, poking a finger at Lena’s arm. Her voice is a bit whiny. “Alex is bullying me. Tell her I don’t cheat at Uno.”
Lena sighs. “You know I love you, darling, but yes, you cheat at Uno.”
“Hey! You’re supposed to be on my team.” (Kara’s cheeks color, and Lena tries to ignore it.)
“This isn’t a team game.”
“Yeah . . . but.” Kara pouts, seemingly at a loss. “Still. I thought we were game night partners for life, and you’ve betrayed me.”
Lena can’t help it—an overwhelming warmth explodes in her chest and sparks through the rest of her, fizzing in her fingertips until she gives in to the urge to raise her hand and cup Kara’s cheek. She smiles, soft and gentle and says, with all the affection she can muster: “Sometimes my Luthor genes just shine through.”
Against her side, Kara slumps, defeated. Her body goes limp and collapses into Lena, practically tipping her over. She’s dead weight, her forehead buried in Lena’s shoulder and her arms wrapped around her waist.
She sighs, heavy and dramatic, and the warmth of her breath makes Lena shiver. “What happened to ‘for better or for worse?’”
“That’s for married people, Kar,” Alex interrupts, her eyes shining with amusement. Lena averts her gaze, unnerved by the way Alex looks at her—like she knows something Lena doesn’t. “You guys aren’t married.”
Lena can feel her pulse in her skull. Are her hands shaking? She feels a bit faint.
Kara’s warm hands slide over hers and she realizes they were, in fact, shaking. But as Kara grabs hold and pulls her back to Earth, her hands still.
“Oh, right,” Kara mumbles, the words spoken directly into the shoulder of Lena’s (stolen) hoodie. “I should work on that.”
What.
What the actual fuck.
Lena is right on the verge of complete and utter panic when Kelly speaks for the first time in a few minutes, her voice smooth and curious as she asks: “You guys are really sweet. How long have you been together?”
Kara’s hands tighten around hers, and Lena feels ill. Her stomach spins, and the room is quiet except for the sound of Nia reshuffling the deck.
Her lungs climb into her throat. Along with her heart and her stomach and all her other vital organs. Her pulse shakes and quivers in her chest.
It’s a question they’ve never known how to answer, and coming from someone so close, it seems wrong to lie, to say something ambiguous and change the subject. (She’s not proud of it, but this is generally the go-to plan.)
Nobody speaks. There’s always been this strange unspoken agreement to not talk about Lena and Kara and whatever the hell they are, and Lena’s always appreciated this, because she also has no idea what they are. She wishes she’d known that agreement was going to break today, so she could mentally prepare herself or flee the country or bury herself in a shallow grave.
Nia looks up from where she’s started dealing out cards for another round, glancing between them and Kelly. Eventually, she turns to Kelly, who looks rather confused by the weird energy that’s settled over the room, and says: “At least as long as I’ve known them. So like, a year minimum?”
She picks up her cards and begins rearranging them into some sort of order, inspecting them with an intensity that would suggest the stakes are far higher than they are.
What? Lena thinks, feeling as though she’s missed something. What the actual fuck?
(This seems to be the only thing she’s capable of thinking, now.)
“What?” Kara squeaks, and Lena opens and closes her mouth like a fish out of water, but no words ever come out. Her jaw snaps shut as Kara starts talking again, stuttering away.
“We aren’t—I mean, it’s not—we’re not—” Kara’s voice cuts off, heavy with uncertainty, and Lena’s heart drops into her stomach. She’s no fool: she knows they’ve never established, or even spoken about them before, and hoping for Kara’s love in that way is perhaps pushing her luck. But it still stings.
More people than Lena’s been able to count have assumed they were dating, and not once has Kara ever denied it. It hurts more than it should to hear her do so now.
“Kara is my best friend,” Lena says. She berates herself for how helpless she sounds; how pathetically lost she feels.
But the look on Nia’s face makes her wish she could turn back time, just a few seconds, and cover Kara’s mouth so she couldn’t say anything.
“Did I say something wrong?” Nia asks. Suddenly, she seems very small, sitting cross-legged on the floor on the other side of the coffee table, holding her Uno cards in both hands.
Lena feels torn between no, of course not, and yes, obviously! (She considers saying nothing and just crying instead.)
Alex chooses for her.
“No, you didn’t. They’re just not aware they’re dating yet.”
“Dating?” Kara’s voice is meek. When Lena chances to look at her, Kara’s face is blank and she’s carefully avoiding her gaze.
Never has Lena wanted to sink into the floor and stop existing more than she does now. She tries to think of something to say to make it all go away and bring the conversation back to Uno or literally anything else, but her mind is a jumble of nothing helpful and instead she turns her head to hide her face against the collar of Kara’s shirt.
Almost like instinct, Kara reaches up to run her fingers delicately through Lena’s hair before settling her arm around her shoulders. (Lena wonders if she’s listening to her heartbeat like she’s admitted to doing so often, and it speeds up at the very thought.)
“I mean, people think you guys are a couple all the time for a reason. You’re disgusting.”
She can’t see Alex, but Lena can just tell that she’s giving them a pointed look, probably gesturing loosely at how they’re wrapped up so close to each other on the couch that they’re practically one body. “Case in point.”
For a moment, no one speaks, and all Lena can hear is Kara’s soft breathing and the sounds of Alex and Kelly finally picking their cards up off the table.
Then—
“Lena?” Kara says, her voice soft and hesitant. Though she doesn’t want to, Lena mumbles: “Yeah?”
The arm tucked around Lena’s shoulders unwinds and a fingertip brushes against the underside of her chin, gently asking her to look up. “Will you look at me?”
Heartbeat a mile a minute, Lena pulls away from where she’s been safely tucked, where no one could see her face and notice the fear in her eyes. She’s always wondered when this would all end, but she’s not ready. Whatever it is that she and Kara have built, it’s always seemed infinite.
(“It looks like we’re out of chips,” she faintly hears Kelly say somewhere behind her, her voice quiet like she’s trying not to pop the bubble Lena feels like she’s been tossed into.
“There are like five unopened bags on the counter?” Nia says, her voice raising at the end like it’s a question when it really isn’t.
“Shut up,” Alex hisses, and there’s an odd thump that sounds a lot like a limb smacking into the coffee table and follow-up strangled squeak that sounds like Nia. “We’ll be back with some chips in fifteen minutes. Please don’t fuck in my apartment.”
“Half an hour,” Kelly says. “Take your time.”
“Do not have sex on my couch.” Alex’s voice would be a lot scarier if Lena were capable of giving it more than thirty percent of her attention.
The door clicks shut.)
“Lena,” Kara starts slowly, her fingers twitching against Lena’s wrist where their hands are still holding on to each other, and Lena tries to break their eye contact but can’t. The look in her eyes is dizzying and Lena feels strangely pliable, like no matter where Kara goes, no matter how her body moves, she’d fall right along with her. Suddenly, the blanket they’re tucked under feels too warm. “Are we dating?”
Lena opens her mouth and closes it again. She presses her lips together so hard it hurts, feeling her chest constrict as she watches Kara’s eyes fill with a worry so gentle it aches. With a fragile touch, Kara’s hand slides up to cup her cheek and the pad of her thumb presses more firmly just under her bottom lip, coaxing her to relax and unclench her jaw.
(Kara’s finger brushes against her lip, and it’s embarrassing how hard it is for her to swallow the strangled noise that crawls up her throat and tries to pry her teeth open to get out.)
“I don’t know,” she says, her voice quiet and bordering on hoarse. “I’ve never known.”
“Me neither.” Kara pauses. “I want to be, though.”
“So do I,” Lena says, almost a whisper. It’s like if she speaks too loud, the world might hear her and take it all away.
But Kara smiles, happy and with so much love flowing out of her that it’s almost overwhelming, and Lena remembers that feeling of whatever they have built as being infinite.
“I’m going to kiss you now, and we’re not gonna tell Alex about it,” Kara says, her expression incredibly serious, but her eyes bright. “Is that okay?”
“Yeah, yes.” The words are breathy and quiet and still fading when Kara leans in, and Lena’s not sure what she expected kissing her to be like, but what washes over her is an all-encompassing sense of warmth and familiarity. She almost can’t believe it’s the first time.
They pull apart and she doesn’t open her eyes, leaves them closed so she can make it last a little longer. When she finally does, Kara is smiling at her so glowingly that her heart grows in her chest to accommodate all the love pouring into her.
“You know I love you, right?” Kara says, oh-so-sweet. Lena reaches up to wipe a smear of lipstick off the corner of her mouth and nods.
“I know,” she murmurs. “I’ve always known. And I love you, too.”
For a moment, Kara just beams. But her eyes shift to the side, where three piles of abandoned Uno cards sit on the coffee table. She looks back and forth between them and Lena, who worries that she knows exactly what Kara’s going to say next.
“We could look at their cards before they get back. They’d never know. We could win.”
(Called it.)
“Uno isn’t a team game.”
“There’s no rule saying we can’t team up against Alex. I’ve checked.”
Lena sighs, shaking her head fondly but with exasperation lacing her tone as she says: “I think I need to help her make lead-lined cards.”