#lena luthor deserves a support system i said what i said

[cardcaptorsakura96]

Taxes, Taxes, Taxes-Chapter 4

Fandom: Supergirl

Characters: Kara Danvers, Clark Kent, Samantha Arias, Lena Luthor, Lillian Luthor

Summary: What if superheroes had to pay a property damage tax every time they had a fight in the city?

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3

Lena sat at a table outside of her favorite restaurant Eduardo’s. She was currently looking through the menu with one hand while the other hand was tapping quickly against the table. 

She thought about her conversation with Supergirl a couple of hours ago, and it made her cringe. 

I hate being beholden to someone like her. Who does she think she is anyway?

Lena sighed and shook her head. Normally when people think they had the upper hand on her she would pull out a wild card and lord her brilliance over them. However, Supergirl was the first person in a long time to point out her shortcomings which she loathed. Lena has always prided herself on being self-sufficient, and it irked her that she had to resort to gimmicks like superheroes in order to get people to see the merit of her hospital. 

At least it is not that asshole. I can’t believe that goddess could be associated with a scum like him. 

Lena immediately blushed at the thought.

Sure, Supergirl is attractive. Especially her muscular legs and arms. I wonder if she has a six-pack. 

Lena quickly shook her head and sighed. 

“I need to get out more,” she muttered. 

I need to get back to the matter at hand. I refuse to let her think she won. I have one more trick up my sleeve if I could just play it just right.

She was lost in thought until she heard someone clear their throat.

Lena rolled her eyes, and said “It took you long enough to come back to take my order.” 

She looked up and froze. Sam was standing next to her with a smirk on her face. 

“Already having second thoughts I see.”

“How did you know I was here?” Lena croaked. 

Sam nonchalantly pulled up a chair next to Lena, sat down, and took the menu out of her hand. 

While perusing the menu, she said, “You and I have been best friends since high school. I think I know your more self-destructive habits by now.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Lena scoffed. 

“When something seems too good to be true, you run in the opposite direction into something that is worse than the original option.”

Lena tried to grab the menu back from the clever brunette, but she was way too quick. Lena sat back and sulk. 

“You still didn’t answer how you found me?”

“You’re lovely assistant Jess told me that you were meeting with mommy dearest today.”

“Traitor,” mumbled Lena. 

Sam chuckled and said, “The saint deserves a raise.”

Lena turned away and muttered, “I don’t know why you both care that I went to see my mother anyway.”

“Because neither of us are blind. We know you are here to ask her to fund the hospital, and we will both quit if you go through with this.”

Lena narrowed her eyes and said, “You’re both bluffing.”

Sam took out her purse and produced two letters to hand to Lena. Her face went pale as she realized that they were resignation letters. 

“I thought both of you liked my mother,” said Lena mystified. 

Sam sighed and said, “Your mother is a lovely person when it comes to personal things like friendship and family. I will always be grateful to her for being an amazing support system to Ruby and me when my mom kicked me out of the house at an early age. However, your mom as a businesswoman is…..less than desirable.”

Lena sighed and said, “I know you believe that my mother’s methods are unsavory…"

“That is an understatement. Lillian got where she is today by fear and intimidation. It works with her company, but it doesn’t foster a lot of trust between her and her employees.”

“I know which is why I wasn’t going to ask her for the money.”

“You weren’t?” asked Sam, narrowing her eyes.

“No, I was just going to tell her about our recent dealings with Supergirl is all.”

Sam stared at her for a moment and started chuckling. 

“What’s so funny?” asked Lena, frowning. 

“You think that your mom is going to give you the money to make you stay away from Supergirl.”

“Well, it is not like anyone in the family likes Superman anyway.”

“You do realize that Supergirl is her own person, right?”

Lena rolled her eyes and said, “That is what she keeps on saying.”

Sam shook her head and stared back up at Lena. 

“Okay. Let’s say this plan of yours works. Do you really think your mom will just give you the money and not want anything in return?”

Lena looked down and started playing with the tablecloth. 

“I do expect her to want to make some changes.”

“And what if we don’t agree with those changes? It would be really awkward to tell her no with us owing her billions of dollars.”

“It’s not like she would lord it over us.”

“I don’t think that she would do that, but I do believe the overall objective of the hospital will change if you go through with this.”

Lena frowned and said, “She knows how important it is for me to provide healthcare for children who couldn’t access it. She wouldn’t be so cruel as to cut that part out of the hospital.”

“I don’t think she would do it automatically. I think she would allow us to treat the current patients here because we made a commitment to them. However, she wouldn’t let anyone else enter the program.”

“You think she would phase it out like that?” 

“I do. The thing is she would have some justification on her side. We are bleeding cash right now. If we had a proof of concept that something like this could be sustainable, it would be one thing, but…”

“Proving it to her would take more time than we have…” muttered Lena as she leaned back into her chair and sighed. 

This hospital was something that Lena wanted to survive. She wanted to prove that a Luthor could do something to give back to the community instead of causing it’s destruction. She looked back at Sam forlorn. 

“Supergirl is the only option.”

Lena hated that conclusion being forced on her, but she realized she couldn’t go through causing the integrity of the hospital to change. 

Sam looked at her cheerfully and said, “Glad that you have come to acceptance on everything. Now, we need to figure out how to make Supercorp a thing.”

“What is a Supercorp?”

Lena and Sam both shrieked. They looked up and Lillian was standing across the table from them. 

As she sat down she said, “I didn’t mean to scare you girls. What are you talking about that has you so captivated that you are not noticing your surroundings?”

Lena felt like her mind was short-circuiting. She knew her original thought was to tell her mother everything, but now she wasn’t so sure anymore. 

Lena quickly composed herself and said, “Nothing of importance. We were just hammering out a minor business issue.”

Lillian cocked her head for a moment with her eyes closed. 

“Super…Super…Super…Wait, did you guys finally find a superhero to help with the hospital?” asked Lillian. 

Lena and Sam gave each other bewildered looks. 

I have to give it to my mother. She is always sharp. 

Lena gave her a forced smile and said, “Actually, we have. However, it is at the beginning stages. No need to bore you with the details.”

Lillian chuckled and said, “Nonsense, I would love to hear all about it.”

“I think you would love this particular hero. They are new on the scene but we do believe that our partnership will do wonders with the hospital,” said Sam.

“Don’t oversell it,” muttered Lena while sulking.

Lillian looked at her daughter's expression and mannerisms and frowned. She sat back in her seat and sighed. 

“What is wrong with this person?” asked Lillian.

“Lillian, what makes you think there is something wrong?” asked Sam. 

“My daughter over there is a nervous wreck.”

“Hey!”

“What? It is true. You have one hand quickly tapping on the table and the other one keeps twisting at the tablecloth. Is this superhero you got mediocre? As long it isn’t that moron Booster Gold, it shouldn’t do anything to tarnish the hospital.”

Lena sighed and looked away. 

Lillian moved her chair closer to Lena and wrapped her arm around her shoulders.

“My dear, it will be okay. We could always give that Booster idiot some etiquette lessons and media training. We can make it work.”

“It isn’t him,” Lena muttered. 

“Then, who is it?”

Lena hesitated for a couple of moments, turned to her mother, and said softly, “Supergirl.”

Lena quickly looked away and awaited to be berated, but nothing came. She looked up and was startled to see that her mom had a faraway look about her. 

“Is everything okay Mom?”

Lillian looked back at her puzzled, but then quickly changed back to a warm smile. 

“Everything’s fine dear.”

Lena stared at her startled and said, “Really? You don’t think this is a terrible idea?”

“Why would I?”

“Given Lex’s issues with Superman, I just thought that you would….”

“Support his obsession with him. You need to give me a little more credit than that.”

“Then, why don’t you say anything about his antics?”

“What makes you think I don’t? He just ignores me like everyone else who doesn’t agree with him.”

“But you still fund his endeavors. It is one of the reasons why he doesn’t harass you.”

Lillian shook her head and chuckled.

“What?”

“You know what your brother’s version of love is. Do you think that I am a willing participant in some of the things he does?”

Lena stared at her startled. 

“Has he threatened you?”

Lillian grabbed Lena and Sam’s hands and said, “Lex tends to exploit weaknesses and knows that I would do anything to protect you girls and Ruby. The only silver lining is that he has only wanted money so far.”

“Why didn’t you tell us sooner?” asked Lena

“Yeah, we could have come up with something to help,” said Sam.

Lillian shook her head and said, “This is something for me to worry about. Besides, I would rather talk about the plans that you have for Miss Supergirl.”

Lena and Sam shared a knowing look. She knew that she couldn’t push the issue anymore with her mother, but that wouldn’t stop Sam and her from figuring out ways to help her later. She shook her head. She was baffled at Lex’s antics. Lex had always tortured her because she was illegitimate. However, she thought that he would never mess with Lillian. He always seemed such a mama’s boy. 

One day I will put that psychotic asshole in his place.

Lena shook her head out of her thoughts as she heard part of what Sam was telling her mom. 

“Well, Supergirl says that she will provide promotional videos and photos for the hospital and participate in fundraising events,” said Sam. 

“That sounds very generous,” said Lillian

“It is not like she is doing it out of the goodness of her heart. She needs to work back the damage she has done for the government, and she believes this will help disassociate her image from Superman,” muttered Lena. 

“You make it sound like a bad thing,” said Lillian. 

“It isn’t genuine.”

“Not all things in business are. When an opportunity arises, you don’t hesitate or scoff at it. You quickly embrace it.”

“So you think I should just not worry about her motives?” asked Lena sarcastically.

“I didn’t say all that. Take the opportunity, but you should go in with your eyes wide open. You never want to allow anyone to get the upper hand.”

Lena shook her head and went back to looking at her menu. 

Lillian chuckled, turned to Sam, and said, “I am sorry that I was late to Ruby’s recital last night. By chance, do you have any pictures?”

“Sure, let me send them to you.”

As Sam looked for her phone, Lillian looked down at her own with a frown. She quickly typed out a message and clicked send: We need to talk. We have a situation brewing. 

[the-wlw-cafe]

Supercorptober 2020 - Day 1: Fall

CW: Temporary character death, grief

Read it on ao3 here!

Lena watches her fall, fall, fall, and be swallowed up by the crowd that assembled on the plaza just a fraction of a second before the sound of impact reaches her ears. She elbows her way through the clamoring people, all the way to the crater she’s left in the asphalt below, and she holds her, cradles her, speaks to her in a hushed tone even after she’s stopped responding. And she stays at her side while she is lying under the yellow sun lamps, looking so small and vulnerable as if she was just resting, and she didn’t move from her side until an indeterminable amount of days later Alex’ insistent hand on her shoulder forced her outside, so they could move Kara.

Kara’s body.

Her legs carry her home, somehow. The second she enters her apartment she feels like she’s broken into a stranger’s place. She stands there, in the middle of the room, for God knows how long, staring at the gigantic comfortable sofa Kara insisted she replace her old, minimalist model with, the calendar next to the door where Kara’s encircled their date nights with red marker hearts, and all the sweet post-it notes Kara likes to leave scattered around the house whenever her Supergirl duties call her away in the early hours of morning, when not even Lena is awake yet.

Liked. Called.

And suddenly, it’s like Lena’s miles and miles underwater, the pressure in this room squeezing around her and suffocating her like an icy-wet, lead-lined blanket. She can’t breathe. She turns around on her heel and flees into the grey dusk. She doesn’t know where she’s going, spends the night in a hotel, doesn’t sleep a wink. Whenever she closes her eyes she sees Kara falling, falling, falling.

Alex doesn’t ask any questions when Lena turns up at her apartment at nine in the morning. Lena doesn’t mention the empty bottles of wine. They sit in silence for a while.

The thought of hugging Alex crosses Lena’s mind, it just seems like something she ought to do in a situation like this, to provide some thought of physical comfort. But the thought alone makes Lena nauseous, the thought of holding Alex like she held Kara’s broken body. She’s never been the hugging type anyway.

Not until she met Kara.

They have a memorial ceremony for Supergirl. It’s a grandiose thing, with millions of watchers worldwide, Cat Grant giving a moving eulogy, the unveiling of an opulent statue and a more subdued plaque on the plaza where Lena had seen her falling, falling, falling. Lena isn’t there.

Kara Danvers has a burial. Alex makes it one paragraph into her speech before her voice fails and her mother gently ushers her away with one arm around her shoulder. Lena is standing on the outskirts, feeling like an intruder as she watches Nia cry into Brainy’s shoulder, watches Kelly take Alex’ hand and hold it like an anchor chain. Just like that, the pressure is back again, the horrible crushing feeling that presses against her from the inside and the outside until she thinks she might well and truly burst if she stays here just a second longer, so she turns and –

“Nonsense, dear. You’re family too.”

It’s Eliza, regarding her with kind eyes and a not-quite-smile, and for the first time in ages Lena feels her eyes well up with tears. She doesn’t even try to hold them back. She just lets herself cry, and cry, and cry, until there’s nothing left inside, until she’s completely hollowed out. She’s too exhausted to stay awake anymore. Her sleep is dreamless.

Now that she’s started crying, she can’t seem to get herself to stop. It’s like a great dam inside her has come loose, and now she’s ready to break down sobbing at the smallest occasion. “If you need anything, anything at all, just call”, Eliza said. Still, it takes Lena half a dozen tries to work up the courage to call Kara’s friends to help her move back into her apartment. She can’t face it alone.

She doesn’t have to. Alex and Kelly are there, of course, but so are Nia and Brainy and even James, who came back for the funeral and planned to stay for a few days to support his sister. The awkwardness she feared might still exist between them is absent as they silently work together to remove all the lovely hidden notes Kara wrote, and gather up her clothes to donate like she wanted. If any of them saw Lena keeping Kara’s comfy university sweater for themselves, they don’t acknowledge it.

She forces herself to eat, tries to, at least, but in the fridge she finds the leftover takeout she’d promised Kara on that day, along with a lazy onesie-clad evening on the couch watching rom-coms. She cries into Kara’s sweater until she passes out. When she wakes up it doesn’t smell like Kara anymore.

Where previously Kara’s presence that had seeped into every pore of the apartment seemed unbearable, Lena now realizes that the opposite is just as agonizing. She wonders how she survived it before, all that loneliness in her spotless apartment devoid of any personality, furnished exactly the way she purchased it. She wonders how she will survive it now.

There are hundreds of people visiting the statue of Supergirl each day, signing their names on the plaque even though it is heavily discouraged, a thousand teary eulogies launched on every social media site in existence. Nobody gives Kara’s grave a second glance. Lena can feel herself being sheltered under this cloak of irrelevance as well, nobody spares her a passing glance as she kneels down next to the featureless marble that marks her resting place. It’s not even close to what a person as phenomenal as Kara Danvers deserves, but then again, anything more grandiose would not have been in line with what she stood for. Lena doesn’t know what to say, she doesn’t know if this is even the right place to be, or if she should instead turn to Rao, billions of light years away. Regardless, this is where she feels close to Kara, close to the gigantic, gaping hole in her chest that seems like it will never stop hurting.

It’s a sunny late summer afternoon, the kind they would have spent visiting the dog park and consuming sacrilegious amounts of ice cream, a not insubstantial amount of which would end up smeared somewhere on Kara’s face. It was an open secret that Kara was doing this intentionally, because Lena would kiss it away every time without fail. Lena can almost feel it, the sun blazing down on them as Kara snort-laughs, a dot of whipped cream dancing on her nose. Just like that, she’s crying again. It’s just about all she can do these days. There’s movement at the edge of her vision, the first, orange colored autumn leaf of many drifting into view. She watches it fall, fall, fall, before gently landing on the yellowed grass below.

They organise another game night. The words it’s what Kara would have wanted hang heavy in the air. It’s not fun in any sense of the word, the few times anyone can actually manage a genuine laugh is quickly stifled and drowned in heavy silence, as if the act itself is heresy. They all hug her goodbye, even though Kara isn’t there to pressure them into it, and Lena finds that she’s actually looking forward to their next game night, if just to spend more time in the company of her friends.

When she returns to Kara’s grave (she hates the word, hates the finality of it), it’s almost completely covered in rust-red dead leaves. The tree looming above is almost bare, a stark contrast to the deep greens of the lush foliage around it. The sight fills Lena with a feeling she doesn’t dare put a finger on.

Still, she visits again, and again, and again. She finds herself obsessively tracking the growth of the circle of dead grass that has begun to grow around Kara’s grave. By the time it reaches the willows surrounding the cemetary and they begin losing their leaves in turn, she can’t deny herself anymore.

“Something’s happening with Kara”, she says in lieu of a greeting, storming into Alex’ apartment unannounced. Please don’t think me insane. Please don’t think me as obsessed and deranged as Lex. Please, for once, listen to me. She averts her eyes, she can’t bear to see the pity in them.

There is a short period of tense silence, then: “So what do we do?”

When Kara opens her eyes three days, five hours and thirty-six minutes later, they're both at her side.

[rudderless-in-an-ocean-of-stars]

in your eyes (i find my salvation), chapter one

In which Kara is human, wasn’t adopted by the Danvers, and has led a pretty shitty life in general.

Inspired by an anonymous prompt asking me to play around with my usual setup and make Kara the one in need of support rather than Lena. This first chapter doesn’t delve too deeply into the details, but this story will deal with topics like abuse, self-harm, and suicide, so turn back now if that’s something you don’t want to be reading.

I intended for this to be a oneshot, but the story took on a life of its own and will likely have at least three chapters.

Here’s the first.

Find it on Ao3 here:

http://archiveofourown.org/works/11225808

Sometimes, she forgets to breathe.

It catches her off-guard, the subtle burn of her lungs that reminds her that she is once again holding her breath, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for something to hurt.

Waiting for someone to hurt her.

Because that is what she has been raised to know better than anything else; the secret language of blood clotting and edging around fist-broken blood vessels and the spidery trails they would lay out in contrast to her pale skin. The whispers in her veins that made her feel cold inside whenever she had to stand in front of a mirror and decide exactly what to wear to hide her bruises.

She has known pain to the extent where a day without injury is a day that she has trouble fitting into her distorted sense of reality. Whether it is a bruise, a cut, even a broken bone, a physical manifestation of her shortcomings is something she has doesn’t- she can’t- remember ever having lived without until she’d finally gotten old enough to fight back.

Five.

That’s how old she was when it started.

What she had done to merit punishment, what was said, none of it registers clearly in her faded remembrances of the past she had spent so long dulling in cheap motel rooms with even cheaper alcohol. But as much as she would like to call those memories forgotten, there is still a scared little girl inside of her that makes her presence known through frigid hands squeezing air from her lungs just to remind her that breathing didn’t always come so easily.

She’s twenty-four now, six years out of the system that had kept her moving from one hellhole to the other just long enough for her temporary guardians to collect the check and send her back out onto the streets to be picked up by the police and sent back to the foster care program where she was nothing but another number to tick off, another burden to house, another mouth to feed, another body to clothe.

She’s twenty-four now, fresh out of college on a scholarship that she’d worked herself ragged to earn. It wasn’t easy, maintaining her grades while switching from school to school on a monthly basis. It hadn’t been easy, but she’d done it.

She’s twenty-four now, two whole decades away from the tragedy that had simultaneously robbed her of her parents and shoved her into the endless cycle of abuse that had dominated her life until she’d aged out of being a ward of the state.

She’s twenty-four now, working her dream job as a reporter for CatCo Worldwide Media- so why does everything still feel so wrong sometimes?

She’s twenty-four now, a capable adult, with friends close enough to call family- so why does she still feel like she’s drowning?

The quiet hiss of the elevator doors sliding open interrupts her train of thought, the sight of the spacious hall stretched out before her reminding her exactly where she is and what she’s supposed to be doing.

Snapper’s words echo in her ears as she makes her way towards the secretary’s desk.

“I don’t care how you do it- scale the side of the building for all I care, zor-El- but I want a statement from that Luthor girl about her alien detection device and a thousand words on my desk before sundown.”

Kara glances down at the nameplate- Jess.

The other woman holds up a slim, well-manicured hand and gestures towards the bluetooth device clipped to her ear, flashing an apologetic smile as she listens the voice on the other end of the line. “Of course. I’ll put you into her schedule as soon as a slot opens up… Yes, I will, of course… You’re welcome… Goodbye.”

“And how may I help you today?” Her sharp gaze quickly finds Kara’s press badge. “CatCo, huh?”

“Yeah, I’m Kara- I called earlier about the possibility of getting a statement-”

“Ah, right. Must be your lucky day- she’s actually in right now and expecting you.” She stands, moving out from behind her desk as she gestures for Kara to follow. “Right this way, Miss zor-El.”

From what she’s seen in pictures, Kara knows that Lena Luthor is pretty.

Dark hair, pale skin, startlingly green eyes, and the kind of fey features you’d expect to see plastered across billboards or television screens. It was obvious even from grainy tabloid shots shot by the paparazzi that Lena Luthor was a beauty.

But ‘pretty’ doesn’t even begin to cover what she looks like in person.

Green eyes meet blue, and for a second, Kara stands speechless.

Lena Luthor is gorgeous.

“You must be the reporter, right?” The barest hints of an Irish accent lace her words. “From CatCo?”

“Y-yes,” Kara stammers out, hurrying forward to shake the C.E.O.’s extended hand. “Kara zor-El.”

Lena levels a warm smile in her direction, and Kara works hard to keep herself from turning even redder than she already has.

“It’s nice to meet you, Kara. Please, have a seat.”

“Thank you.” She holds up a slender, silver-grey recorder. “Would you mind-?”

Lena shakes her head, learning back in her seat, adopting a surprisingly casual pose as she abandons the paperwork in front of her. Kara switches on the recorder and sets it down on the edge of the desk.

“So,” she starts, and all Kara notices is that her smile is still wonderfully warm, “Am I right in assuming you’re here about one of my company’s latest developments?”

“Yes,” she says, suddenly grateful for the notes she’d jotted down on her way to the building, “I’d like to ask you about the alien detection device your company recently announced.”

“Ah, that.” Lena’s nose wrinkles in dismay. “It’s become quite a polarizing topic of debate.”

Kara hums in agreement, bouncing the top of her pen against the notepad in her lap. “Yes. Our readers are curious about your own personal views on the matter, Miss Luthor.”

“Lena,” the brunette corrects sharply, and it’s the hardest tone Kara’s heard the woman take since she set foot in the room. “Please, call me Lena.”

“Of course.” She keeps her expression carefully neutral, but makes a mental note to find out the reason behind the C.E.O.’s reluctance to go by her last name. “Lena, this device has been called ‘anti-alien.’ Would you agree with that description?”

“Honestly? No.”

“Can you elaborate?”

“Of course.” Lena shifts in her seat, shoulders straightening somewhat, an air of regality settling around her like a cloak. Kara firmly pushes down the sudden urge to adjust her own pose accordingly. “This device’s only function is to identify non-human entities residing on this planet. It is meant to inform, not persecute. My company fully intends to comply with the President’s new decree concerning aliens taking refuge on Earth. Law enforcement will have access to this device, provided they have the authority to use it to identify humanoid aliens deemed a threat to the safety of others. Beyond that, we have no wish to expose anyone who does not wish to reveal their planetary origin.”

“So your company has no plans to market this to the general public for commercial use?”

“None whatsoever. There are too many groups out there with questionable motives concerning aliens here on Earth, and I, for one, do not intend on helping them achieve that agenda.” Her eyes all but crackle with a furious defiance as she continues. “Aliens have- and rightfully deserve- the same rights that we humans enjoy and often take for granted. Being different is not synonymous with being bad, or evil, or whatever else these so-called ‘pro-human’ groups are saying. This device is meant to save lives, alien and human alike, not endanger them.”

“That sounds very… noble, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

“Being ‘noble’ has nothing to do with it. Everyone deserves a chance at a fresh start, and some of our extra-terrestrial citizens have traveled a long way to secure one. L-Corp and myself don’t plan on helping anyone take that away.”

Kara reaches out to switch off the recorder and tuck it into her purse almost robotically, still semi-entranced by the woman in front of her. “Th-thank you, Lena,” she stammers out, breathless for reasons she can’t quite explain, “I think that’s more than enough for the article.”

She stands up, feeling considerably lighter than she’s felt in a long time. There’s something contagious about Lena’s spark, the fire that glows in her eyes, the electricity that fairly dances off of her skin.

Lena Luthor burns with the kind of ferocity and conviction that makes her seem almost unreal, bright in a way that makes even the sunlight shining through the floor-to-ceiling windows behind her pale in comparison.

“Thank you, Kara, for giving me the chance to take the reins on this interview. Most reporters come here with a very specific set of questions meant to… Well, meant to box me in and make me sound like whoever it is they want me to appear to be in their writing.” Lena gets to her feet and stretches out a hand, smiling once more. “You let me be clear about what it is that myself and my company stand for in spite of the controversy this device has been causing.”

“It was my pleasure, Lena. To be honest, this is going to be my first article. I’m glad I got someone as wonderful as you to interview.”

She laughs, and the sound of it is music to Kara’s ears.

“I know you’ll do me justice.”

Her hand’s just barely brushed the polished knob of the door when Lena calls out from behind her.

“Kara?”

She spins on her heel, turning so quickly that she just barely avoids falling.

“Yes?”

Lena bites her lip, looking mildly apprehensive, and the expression is jarring to witness. Even though she’s spent all of ten minutes with the woman, surety seems to be one of her defining traits.

“Would you-” She pauses, once again tugging her bottom lip between her teeth, the sight of which Kara knows she’ll never be able to forget. “I know it might be more than a little inappropriate, but, well, when you’re finished with your article… Would you like to go to dinner with me?”

Kara freezes, and Lena must take it as a sign of rejection, because she hurries to speak before Kara can recover enough to open her mouth.

“As-as friends, of course,” Lena stutters, cheeks turning the palest shade of pink, “I just-“

“I’d love to.”

The hours leading up to dinner become an interesting affair.

Kara had made the mistake of telling Winn, who could never keep a secret from Alex, who couldn’t resist the urge to inform Maggie, who took gleeful pleasure in plotting ways to abuse the government resources of not one, but two branches of law enforcement to run multiple background checks on Lena with the aid of J’onn-

All of whom are now in Kara’s apartment, along with Lucy Lane and James Olsen- the only friends of hers who hadn’t attempted to pry any further once learning of her scheduled dinner with the C.E.O. of L-Corp.

Lucy’s rifling through Kara’s closet under the bossy supervision of Alex, who continues to steal sips from Winn’s beer without remorse.

“Not that one- that cardigan belongs to a nunnery-” Alex neatly sidesteps the elbow jab aimed at her side as Kara voices a feeble protest.

She crosses her arms, a move that ends up looking much less imposing than she intends, given the fact that she’s wearing nothing more than a fluffy bathrobe at the moment.

“Blue,” Winn pipes up from his position, currently sprawled across Kara’s bed. “Or green. The interview Lena gave for Teen Vogue a few years back had those listed as her favorite colors.”

Kara rolls her eyes in exasperation. “You’d all make excellent stalkers, you know that?” She plops down on an unoccupied corner of the bed with a huff. “Besides, it’s just a dinner between friends.”

“Lena’s bisexual,” Lucy calls out from the depths of Kara’s closet, sounding slightly muffled but no less enthusiastic, “So you’ve got a fair chance with her.”

“How did you even…” Kara shakes her head, sighing, “Never mind. I probably don’t want to know.”

“Know what?” Maggie strolls in, an open box of pizza balanced in her hands. She waggles her brows suggestively at Kara as she takes a seat at the little white vanity across the room from the bed.

“Nothing,” Kara says, just as Alex grins and heads over to snatch a slice of cheesy goodness from the box.

“Know how Lucy managed to find out that Lena’s bisexual,” she mumbles around a mouthful of pizza, winking at her girlfriend as she resumes her post by the closet.

“Something with sleeves, please,” Kara calls out to Lucy, now resigned to her fate to be annoyed to death by her friends, “I don’t want…”

She trails off, and the air in the room seems to thicken.

They all know about Kara’s past- the same way Kara knows about Winn’s homicidal father, Alex’s low self-esteem courtesy of her mother’s ultra-high expectations, Lucy’s over-controlling father, Maggie’s homophobic family, and so on and so forth.

Like calls to like, or so it seemed when it came to the motley group of people Kara now calls family.

Lucy doesn’t miss a beat. “No problem, Kara. Showing off your excellent biceps can wait until the third date.”

The others voice their agreement, and Kara’s heart swells to bursting with affection for her friends as the tension in the room dissolves amidst their laughter and teasing.

It doesn’t stop the scars on her wrists from suddenly itching, though, as her thoughts linger on the real reason most of her clothing is so conservative.

Winn nudges her with a sock-covered foot. “You okay there, champ?”

“Fine, just…” She frowns. “Lena’s just so… So perfect. I don’t want to mess this up.”

“Nobody’s perfect.” Winn shoots a lopsided grin in her direction. “But I get how you feel.”

She smiles, and he pats her leg with his foot a few times in a way that’s surprisingly comforting. “Thanks, Winn.”

For the next few weeks, Kara finds herself smiling and laughing more than she has in years.

Lena is kind and funny and effortlessly enchanting, the kind of person that makes hours feel like minutes in their presence.

Going home after their dates always feels a little like returning to another reality altogether.

Somewhere along the line, weekly dinners and casual lunches had evolved into something more than friendship.

Everything goes well until it doesn’t.

Lillian Luthor breezes into town- an event that Alex will soon refer to as the arrival of the devil herself- and all the little things about Lena and her reluctance to talk about her family that Kara had filed away to bring up at a later date finally slides into place.

Kara finds her waiting in her office, smiling in a dead-eyed way that she’d become all-too familiar with during her time in the foster system.

“So,” she drawls, because there’s no other way to describe how the words just fall from her mouth like poisoned syrup, “You’re the girl my daughter’s allowed herself to be distracted with.”

“Excuse me?” In a few seconds, everything will become clear, but right now, the woman darkening her office is a stranger. “Who are you and how did you get into this building?”

“I’m Lillian Luthor, dear,” she says, something dark and inscrutable flashing in her eyes, glacial in comparison to Lena’s warm, steady gaze, “Lena’s mother.”

And something in Kara’s stomach drops at her words, leaving her equal parts unsettled and wary as she does her best to return Lillian’s icy stare.

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