Chapter Text
“Hey, thanks for coming tonight, Danvers.” Maggie blurts out as Alex pockets number 8 in the top left corner.
“Sounds like you were really missing getting your ass kicked, detective.“
Maggie smiles, because Alex is smiling too as she pockets the money they bet, and it almost feels like they’re back.
“I’m going to be nice and get you a drink with this” she teases, waving the notes just an inch from Maggie’s nose. The detective sits on the edge of the pool table, defeated. Alex Danvers, master of deception. Who’d think she’s hurting? She’s back with two pints of blonde beer, and a bowl of peanuts she’s holding with her mouth.
“Mhh mh mplif” she mumbles.
“Excuse me what?” Maggie frowns “You have something in your mouth” she points at her own lips, oblivious.
Alex rolls her eyes and moves past Maggie to put the glasses on the table, and finally gets the bowl out of her mouth. “Fuck you, Sawyer - is the first thing she says when her lips are free - and here I am, feeding you. Ungrateful.” Maggie smiles and nods, but there’s a shadow of sadness in her eyes. “Mh, I’ve been called that before” she comments, trying for casual. But it comes out more bitter than she’d like. Alex squints, and takes a sip from her glass.
“Maggie” Alex says, softly. It’s unusual, and Maggie holds her glass in front of her lips, eyes questioning. “Can I ask you something? Something personal?”
“Sure, Danvers, shoot. I think we’re way into personal.“
“You don’t really have to answer but…” Alex takes a slightly deeper breath “Why did you break up with your ex?”
It hits a little harder than she thought it would, but Maggie hides it well. “You really can’t wrap your head around it, mh?” she says with a cheeky wink.
Alex blushes a little, and stutters “N-no I’m just… pff, I-” but then she shrugs, and admits, “yeah, ok. It’s true. I don’t understand why anybody would dump you.“
It’s cute, Maggie thinks, how hard Alex thinks she’s fallen for her. Well, that’s about to change, she tells herself.
“I guess it’s as good a time as any to tell you…” she hesitates a little “she couldn’t accept a part of my identity. She thought she could, but when the time came she… she couldn’t cope, I guess.” Maggie shakes her head, unknowingly, while placing the balls in the rack.
“Mh” Alex frowns “Why? What are you? I mean-“ Alex holds a hand out “that sounded a bit indelicate, sorry. But if you want to elaborate…?”
Maggie straightens her back and tilts her head, a half smile painting a dimple on her left cheek.
“I’m polyamorous.“
A puzzled stare is waiting for her on Alex face.
“Is that a type of… alien? Cause I’ve never heard of it.”
“It may as well be” she sighs. “No, I’m human. I’m just not monogamous.“
Maggie can almost hear the sound of shattering glass behind Alex’ wide eyes. And she’s looking at her like that. She’s seen that look before, a look of unbridgeable distance.
“You’re not… Ok” Alex frowns a little more “So why… I mean what… Did she know?”
“Yeah she knew.” Maggie breaks a little stronger than usual, two balls end in two different holes. The table is a mess of trajectories for a couple of seconds. Maggie taps her pool stick on the ground and leans on it. “I told her on our second date. She said it made me more interesting, that she liked open minded people. She thought we could have fun with another girl sometimes.“
“Oh.” Alex takes a big gulp of beer, looking away. There seems to be a lot she doesn’t know about Maggie.
“It never happened, it’s not really my thing.” Maggie explains, and suddenly she looks exhausted. But she continues: “We were together for two years, and I had never met anyone I was interested in. I wasn’t looking, and it didn’t happen. So I guess she forgot.”
“Can you take a step back?” Alex interrupts “What does… What is a polyamorous, exactly?“
“Polyamory is ethical non-monogamy” Maggie recites, like a textbook, and Alex can tell she had had to give that speech more than once “People are allowed to have more than one meaningful relationship at a time, and everybody involved is aware of it.”
Alex nods, but still looks confused.
“You can have one, two, three partners, and they all know about each other.” Maggie explains again.
“That is… that sounds weird. Don’t people get jealous?“
“Yes, sometimes. But they work on it. They talk. They explain what makes them jealous…” Maggie sighs again “Or at least they should.”
Alex puts her bafflement on the side, and tries not to think about how she would feel if Maggie were her girlfriend, and suddenly told her she wanted to be with someone else.
“So what changed?” she asks.
“As I said, the issue didn’t come up for a long time. Having more than one partner is a lot of work, and I already spend too much time on my job. I like to give my partners the attention they deserve, not spread myself thin. We were working fine as your normal, average monogamous couple. Until… I met someone.“
Alex almost gasps. Is it jealousy, the pang she feels in her chest? Who did Maggie meet?
“I met someone, and developed the worst crush.” she laughs, nervously “It was bad. So bad. I tried to ignore it, but I just… I just really, really liked her. So I told Emily.”
“Emily being your ex?“
“Emily being my ex. I told her, and she snapped. She said I didn’t love her, and why was I looking for someone else, and wasn’t she enough for me? How could I think it’d be acceptable to say it out loud? Did I want to leave her for someone I had just met? Et cetera.”
“Is that the time she called you a sociopath?”
“That’d be the time” Maggie concludes, dryly. “She said I couldn’t understand basic human emotions. She painted me like a monster. And the funniest thing? I wasn’t even planning to act on it. I just wanted to be completely honest with the woman I loved, and all I got in return was to be called insensitive, stubborn and… all that other stuff.“
“Wow.” Alex raises her eyebrows, her head spinning slightly. “I have to say that’s not…”
“What?” Maggie says defensively.
“Not the story I expected, that’s it. I guess there’s a lot I don’t know about the world in general, not only myself.“
Maggie nods, resigned. “Well one thing is for sure” she concludes “I’m not dating another monogamous person.”
And that’s when Alex finally understands. She understands both, really. She understands Maggie, because she warned Emily. She was open since the very beginning. But she also understands Emily, who hoped she could change her partner, who hope’d she’d be good enough to be the only one. And she understands she truly has no chances with Maggie.
“I know what you’re thinking” Maggie makes her wince, noticing she spent way too long staring at the white ball “why couldn’t she just pick one?“
“I… yeah.” Alex admits “you’d have to eventually, right?”
“Why?” Maggie is starting to feel irritated “People have two children, and they love them equally. They have two pets, two parents, two friends and they can’t pick the one they love the most. I loved Emily. So much. But I also fell for someone else and it was just as strong. Have you never been in love with two people?”
“I’m not sure I’ve ever been in love before you.“
The words leave her mouth before she can think better of it, and Shit, Danvers - she tells herself - chill a little. She can see the detective almost wobbling at the revelation. Maggie nods, uncomfortable: “yeah, no, I guess you wouldn’t get it.”
“I just think-“
“Can we just… can we talk about something else?” Maggie cuts her off, sharply.
“Sure” Alex replies, taken aback.
An awkward silence falls between them, broken by the knock of a ball that sends number 6 so far from the hole, Alex thinks Maggie just wanted to hit something with something else.
“Maggie, I’m sorry.” Alex takes a step closer, and rests a hand on her forearm “I know how it feels, to be questioned after coming out. Kara asked me so many question, I felt like I had to defend my identity… but she was just trying to understand. And so am I.”
The detective smiles, and tilts her head to the side “Sorry I snapped. It’s still very fresh.“
“How about we talk about work instead?” Alex proposes, raising her pint.
“Sounds great.” The clinking noise of their glasses touching closes the topic.
- - -
Alex spends the trip on her taxi thinking about what Maggie told her.
It changes everything. She had dreamt of kissing her, taking her on a date, hell she had thought about the names of their beautiful adopted babies, but she never thought she’d have to share her. Was it even worth trying, if she’d never be enough for Maggie? Why did she have to be like that? Couldn’t she just-
I’m talking exactly like Emily.
Alex scolds herself internally, but it must show because the driver asks “Are you ok, ma’am?”
She nods.
The roads are empty and soon she’s home. Her flat looks slightly emptier somehow, as if someone had just taken away the biggest piece of furniture. And Alex knows what’s missing is the hope that she was still holding on to, the hope one day, when the timing was right, Maggie could be hers.
- - -
“Alex? Alex you’re doing it again” Winn whispers, and gently stops her hand from digging through the whole notepad with her pen. J’onn is briefing them on a possible fugitive who can bend metal with his mind, or melt it, she’s not sure. She’ll ask Kara to recap. She’s made at least three pads unusable, and snapped a whopping thirteen pencils in the past two days.
“Ok, what’s going on?” Kara is towering above her, fists on her hips. Everybody else has already left.
“Nothing, I’m good. Shall we get the Last Metalbender or-“ She stands, and Kara promptly pushes her back down.
“J’onn just said we won’t be able to find him during the day, were you even listening? We need to wait till sunset.“
Alex looks away, irritated, and before she knows it another pencil is gone.
“Alex please, talk to me?” Kara begs, pouting a little. “Is this about Maggie? I knew it wouldn’t be a good idea to pretend you can be friends…”
“Friends is the only thing we can be, she was right” Alex cuts her off.
“…ok” Kara says, tentatively “so what’s the matter?”
“I’m… it’s complicated?” Alex looks lost, and Kara kneels down, resting her palms on her sister’s thighs.
“What is?”
“You know, before I had this hope that if I could wait it out, if I could get more comfortable with my… orientation, at some point Maggie would consider dating me. Maybe not soon, maybe I’d have to wait years, but I could maybe have my happy ending with her. And now, even if I get it, it would never be perfect.“
“I…” Kara frowns “I’m not sure I know what you mean… what did Maggie tell you?”
Alex bites her lips, and looks like another word would make her burst into tears. So Kara continues: “Look, Alex… I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure no relationship is perfect. People have this flawless, pure idea of how it should be, and anything short of that feels like failure. Maybe you could be a bit more… open to possibilities?“
“I don’t know, I always thought it would be one way, and now..” she sniffles, and words fail her.
“To be fair, you also thought you were straight.”
Alex bursts into a short laugh, and is ever so grateful she has a sister who can do that to her.
“You’re going through a lot of changes, Alex” Kara continues “maybe it’s better if you take one at a time. If Maggie can’t give you what you need right now, it’s good she just wants to be friends. Maybe she was right after all.”
Alex nods, somehow angry at the fact that she can’t really be angry at Maggie.