into the garbage chute, flyboy!

HOLD UP. She's playing another one!? I was aware of Maia Rindell (I need to finish watching The Good Fight) but have I missed a new one? I am fully ready to go feral over this.

[Sidenote that I totally count Gwen from Downton as another wlw character because she was CLEARLY making reciprocated eyes at Sybill but that's neither here nor there.]

First of all, sorry it took so long! That block was something. Second of all, my clown ass got up at 3AM to watch this show because I clearly wanted to be disappointed live. BUT. On the bright side, the Supercorp crumbs along with this prompt merged together in my lizard brain and this came out, so thank you so much for curing my writer's block!

Kiss #9 was "unbuttoning your lover’s shirt, pressed against the wall", and I hope it's soft enough, Anon 💖

Alex doesn’t help.

She tries to, of course. She does everything right. She holds Kara and lets her cry it out and offers potstickers and wine and unconditional support. She does all the things that usually help.

It’s just— tonight, they don’t.

Alex leaves when Kara assures her she’s fine — she’s tired and she just needs to sleep it off, probably, and Alex should go back home to Kelly because Kara is fine, she promises — but Kara is just as far from fine as before. Just as rattled, just as unable to settle. Like a part of her hasn’t quite gotten the memo that she’s back home yet.

Getting into bed doesn’t help, either.

She should be able to fall asleep. This isn’t the deafening silence of the Phantom Zone. There’s the bustle of National City outside her window, the muffled sounds of her neighbors living their lives in the apartments above and below and next to hers. But it’s not—

It’s not right.

Kara frowns, eyes tightly shut as she listens and listens and tries to figure out what’s off. What’s different. It’s like listening to a familiar song but slightly off-key. A familiar song where one of the background instruments is not quite right. Where something’s just—

Something’s missing.

She’s flying across the Atlantic seconds after the realization hits her, hair haphazardly held in a messy bun that must look downright absurd paired with Supergirl’s sleek suit, but Kara doesn’t care right now. She’s figured out what’s missing and she has to— she needs to— she can’t stop and think about her hair or the beautiful color of the sun rising over green cliffs right now.

Kara closes her eyes and listens. Just like she did in National City just minutes ago, when it was an off-key midnight with something missing. Now it’s early morning in Ireland, and Kara doesn’t even know what that’s supposed to sound like. It sounds like the sea and the waves and the murmur of voices she’s never heard before, and—

Oh. There she is.

She just listens for a few seconds, hovering in the sky and letting that familiar rhythmic beat wrap around her heart like a vice. Like a warm blanket. Like both, somehow. Kara follows the soft thump-thump-thumping across fields and roads and small villages until she’s flying through the open window of a cozy little house and landing right in front of—

“Lena,” Kara breathes out, relief washing over her like she’s just fought her way home all over again.

“Kara.” Lena turns around and Kara notices she’s still wearing the same clothes she was wearing back in National City. “What are you—“

Kara kisses her before she can finish her question. And normally— normally she wouldn’t do something like this. She’d let Lena finish talking, and she’d wait, and she’d make sure this is the right thing to do, but hasn’t she waited enough? Haven’t they wanted enough?

Lena seems to think so. Because one of her hands is on Kara’s shoulder and the other is tangling in Kara’s hair and her tongue flicks against Kara’s top lip before sliding into Kara’s mouth. And Kara can hear the heartbeat she followed to find Lena speeding up when Kara uses her height to her advantage to press Lena up against the wall behind her, fingers quickly working on unbuttoning her shirt.

And Lena is— she’s so soft, even an increasingly kiss-drunk Kara has to marvel at the feeling of warm skin under her fingertips when her hand slips beneath the fabric of Lena’s open shirt. And it’s all a bit too much. The taste of Lena’s mouth on her tongue and the feeling of Lena’s skin against her palm that makes her nearly want to cry because she hasn’t felt softness like this in so long. Since before the Phantom Zone. Before everything went wrong and then even worse. Since before, when things were soft and simple and it was just them and their shared take-out dinners and their smiles heavy with unspoken things and Kara felt more alive — more real — than ever before.

Maybe that’s why the Girl of Steel is the one who breaks the kiss to come up for air, forehead resting against Lena’s as she takes in a very human, shaking breath.

“What are you doing here?” Lena finishes her question from before, voice soft and hand even softer as it cups Kara’s cheek. And Kara— Kara could just exist here, just like this, not an ounce of steel to the way she feels herself surrender to Lena’s touch, for the rest of her life.

“You said you wanted to come home,” Kara says, turning her face to kiss Lena’s hand as she gently pushes Lena’s shirt off her shoulders. Lena nods silently when Kara leans in to press a lingering kiss to her collarbone, and whimpers quietly when Kara’s lips move to the bottom freckle on her neck. “I needed to be home, too.”