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cookinguptales · 2 years ago

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Now that the post is over 10k and my notes are straight-up unusable...

One thing I wish I'd spelled out more explicitly in the original post because I see this point getting lost on a lot of rebloggers who don't understand why the healthcare thing was such a big deal is like

The subtext I thought would be understood bc I lived back then but apparently has been lost today is that making sure queer employees and their partners had healthcare in the early 90s meant Disney was paying for a lot of AIDS treatment.

This is one reason fundie Christians were so upset and queer employees were so grateful. It's one reason why it was such a controversial decision. It was a major talking point amongst my family, who believed back then that AIDS was a punishment from God.

(Some still do, I think. We don't talk.)

I keep seeing people saying that Disney only chose that option "because of their bottom line" and it's like??? Were you listening??? Disney has been paying for that decision for literally decades, but they've stood by it.

Like... the 90s weren't like now! It wasn't profitable to cater to the queer population of the country back then. They weren't raking in money with this.

It's in no way a perfect company but I fully believe in criticizing people for the specific things they do wrong and praising them for the specific things they do right. Disney has fucked copyright, monopoly, and labor laws and I'm not about to defend that. But they are well known in FL for being friendly to both queer people and disabled people, and that is unambiguously a good thing.

(Like side note, I could talk about Disney and accessibility for days. I have traveled extensively while disabled and no one does it like Disney.)

I've had people reblogging the post like "I straight-up don't believe Disney is an industry leader in equal protections for queer employees" and it's like ??? do you think I just pulled this out of my ass? If you want more information, go look it up! You'll see that this is well-established history. It's not my fault y'all don't read! :|

#I know I know #having a post go viral on tumblr is always a blessing and a curse #I'm happy that the word is getting out to so many people #I genuinely thought this history was more well-known than apparently it is #especially with younger users #but when your post starts doing numbers you have to start dealing with people who always wanna deal with ideas in bad faith #cw:#disney #homophobia #aids

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sssammich · 11 months ago

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fic: come what may

a/n: this is a continuation of THIS post which was inspired by the fanart. please give that fanart some love if you haven't, it was so very compelling to me and that's why we're here.

anyway read the first part and then come back to this lol

---

Lena retreated to the single stall washroom after graciously thanking everyone around her for their applause and cheering. In the quiet of the small space, she was able to think about the last five minutes of her life.

It had been a week since she had spoken last with the caped hero, the word ‘villain’ rang in Lena’s ears still to this day.

It had stung her, lanced through her more like. But in this world, she had no choice but to keep moving forward if only to survive. She knew that reintegrating Lex back into her life was a risk, but what was the alternative? To let back in the one person she’d trusted with so much of herself only to be the same one who broke Lena irreparably? It figured that they would be one in the same. Supergirl had a habit of being duplicitous, after all.

Despite all of these thoughts, the dance had been more than she anticipated. For a brief moment in time, her world narrowed to the size of the dance floor when she and her former best friend twirled and glided across the space, held close to one another, swaying to the beat of the song.

Until Supergirl called out to her, the tenor of her voice bringing up a world long gone, the time together but a distant memory. Only to then ask her, “what’s your plan here, Lena?”

The illusion broke through and shattered all around them, and her eyes darkened, her heart hardened.

“You will never trust me,” she announced finally when she looked at Kara’s beautiful face, her equally beautiful blue eyes. Now, an enemy. “I can see it in your eyes.”

She pulled away and turned, not sure she could look at that face again, anymore. Still, she would admit that it was enough consolation to see Supergirl on edge, to put her on her red-booted back foot.

She recalled turning her head slightly and caught enough of Supergirl's departure from the middle of the dance floor and into the evening sky. It gave her some satisfaction, but not nearly enough to placate the ache in her chest.

Lena stared at her reflection; her makeup remained impeccably applied, impeccably in place despite the exertion of their dancing. The heat of Kara’s hands lingered all over her body, the warmth of those hands pressed into her, holding her in the illusion of safety as the song notes progressed. Her former best friend was clumsy in her movements, at least at first. It would have delighted Lena plenty to see Supergirl stumble her way through her movements. Yet, she held her own and led the two of them throughout the dance floor in an acceptable tango. On any other day, any other moment, she would have been charmed by it, let herself be led around so long as they stayed in each other's arms.

But those moments were no longer accessible to them.

She returned to her guests and maneuvered through the compliments and conversations, but every now and again, she glanced up into the open sky. Just in case.

—

In the end, Lex was defeated and rid of once and for all. The details of it were fuzzy to her now, but none of it mattered. Simply that he was gone from her life for good, that he would no longer be a terror to anyone and everyone, to those she loved.

Once again, however, she was left to pick up what remained of his ruinous rampage, if only to be surrounded by something beyond her isolation.

It was just a few scant weeks ago that she’d reached a truce with Kara and her Superfriends (nevermind that she’d once thought of them as her own friends, as well). Now here she stood weeks later: alone.

Lena had run out of options or excuses and finally sought out help from Kara without hope or expectation for true reconciliation or forgiveness, from either of them. They’d drawn their lines from one another so long ago, she’d considered them carved in stone.

Now she stood on her empty balcony overlooking the city just after the sun had set and the sky was now engulfed in dark blue.

Without a brother, a mother, a father. An orphan, twice over. It seemed that she was destined to live in solitude. They say no man was an island, yet perhaps Luthors were.

She gazed at the last remnants of the setting sun across the horizon, not giving away that she heard the sound of a cape billowing at the far end of the balcony. She made no move to say or do anything, simply took a sip of the amber liquid in her glass. If Supergirl had anything to say, then Lena was not going to stop her.

“How are you?” Kara finally said, after minutes trickled past them.

She scoffed, unable to help herself. She glanced over her shoulder and watched as Kara hovered outside of the balcony. She simply took another sip of her drink.

Kara, never one to leave well enough alone, moved so that her feet touched the ground and she stood somewhere behind her. Lena closed her eyes and took a swig of all of her remaining drink.

“You’re trespassing.”

“I know.”

“I can have you arrested.”

“That’s fine.”

“What do you want from me?”

“A dance.”

Lena quickly turned around, Kara standing only a few feet away, her arm outstretched. She glanced up and met blue eyes, an ocean of patience.

Resigned, Lena unfurled the fist by her side and placed it in the offered hand. She took a step forward until their bodies were almost flush with one another, Kara’s other hand placed on the small of her back. An easy fit between them. A thought that Lena shoved into a box for rumination and reflection later on.

“There’s no music,” she commented needlessly even as she put her free hand on Kara’s shoulder, her nerves manifesting in lightly scratching the fabric of the supersuit under her fingertips.

“There’s always music.” Just then, Kara pulled her phone from a hidden compartment behind her and pressed the screen until soft music started playing. It was the final duet in Moulin Rouge between the two leads, where she and Kara shed a tear or two when they watched it in the past—a distant lifetime ago. They were now extraordinarily different people from those versions of themselves.

“This musical was a tragedy.”

The superhero shrugged, her eyes focused past Lena’s head. “I know.”

“Are you trying to tell me something?”

Kara eventually returned her attention until their eyes met and Lena waited. She watched as Kara took a deep breath and offered Lena a cautious smile, resignation plastered on her own face. “I’m trying to tell you a lot of somethings.”

She studied Kara’s face, wanted to glean any kind of information from her features alone, but Kara betrayed nothing. “Start with one.”

“I’ve been practicing.” When she furrowed her brows in confusion, Kara clarified by twirling Lena out of her embrace only to pull her back into her orbit once again. This time without bumbling through any of the movements nor without a stutter in her steps.

The move surprised Lena enough to take her breath away, her senses suddenly alight as she considered what any of it meant. When? How? Why?

“Tell me another,” she whispered, her hands grasping tighter onto Kara just as the song started to swell.

“I want to start over.”

Lena stopped in her tracks so Kara did, too. Distantly, Lena observed that neither released their holds of one another.

“Why? We’ll only hurt each other.”

“Maybe. Probably,” Kara supplied before tugging Lena back closer to her and swayed side to side to encourage Lena to do the same. “But life without you in it is infinitely worse, I think. So if it’s all the same to you, I’ll take my chances.”

Lena’s heart felt like it was getting catapulted across time and space. And maybe it was actually getting catapulted along with every sway she took with Kara. Still, she couldn’t help but push. “Even with a villain?”

Kara grimaced slightly before flashing an apologetic smile. “Sure, Lena. Even with a villain.”

“I was one, you know,” she offered, watching for Kara’s response. She was complicit, had gotten her own hands dirty. She owned up to that.

“I know.” But Kara simply shrugged and brought them closer. “Believe it or not, I’ve been one, too. You’re not exactly very special in that department, Lena.”

A small laugh that bubbled out of her caught her off guard, and Kara smiled at her before spinning her away and back together again until Lena hid her face against the crook of Kara’s neck until the song finally ended.

They parted from each other, Kara taking a step back until she was a few feet away, her hands clasped in front of her.

“Thanks for the dance,” Kara said.

“You’ve gotten better.”

“I appreciate that. It means the practice has been paying off.” As if nodding to herself, Kara gave her a smile and began to turn so as to take off into the night sky, but Lena stopped her.

“Tell me one more,” she urged, realizing she didn’t want their interaction to end quite yet.

Kara then looked over her shoulder. “Can I come back tomorrow?”

“If you’d like.”

“I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

“I’ll hold you to it.”

Kara’s body twisted so she was looking at Lena more fully. “Goodnight, Lena.”

“Goodnight, Kara.”

Lena watched as she took off into the sky, disappearing into the night. She’d stayed out there for a little while longer, the heat of her drink coursing through her veins while the moment between them warmed her against the cool breeze that passed through.

Nothing had yet been fixed, and there was a long road ahead of them. But something in her caged heart had loosened, allowing her to breathe again. That was a start.

#samfic #supercorp #kara danvers #lena luthor #some canon divergence re: s5 #supercorp sunday #totally gonna count it as that #I KNOW i have other things #don't worry about those they'll get written #but you know how the lazy susan gets #she's fickle as hell #anyway shoutout to tumblr user lililustra #for the art #I ALSO TOOK IT probably a whole different direction than their intentions but here we are #it's fine it's fine

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