The Corner

Kara

“Don’t chew anything, don’t pee on anything.” I whispered against Pepper’s fur as I set her down on the wooden floor of Lena’s penthouse. I straightened her little sweatshirt before letting her go. She didn’t move, just looked up at me, waiting for my cue.

The penthouse was dark, Lena’s heels were kicked to the corner, her briefcase dropped on the couch. A trail of clothes pointed me in the direction of the hallway. I looked around the room, listening just in case. A bad habit born out of hiding in shadows and running for my life. After a breath I took a step forward, calling out her name. “Lena?”

There was no answer, worrying me. I pulled my phone out, moving to text her when Pepper suddenly scampered towards the hallway, barking as she went. “Dammit, Pepper. Wait for me. There could be murderers in here.” I grumbled, walking after her. I’d spent the night here last night, but didn’t pay a lick of attention to anything other than the bedroom and the bathroom. Too high on love to remember the floorplan like I always did whenever I was in a room. Another bad habit, always clocking the entrance, the exits and the best place to hide if a bomb went off.

I heard Pepper bark at the end of the hallway, past Lena’s bedroom. I rushed towards her, catching the little dog sitting at a door, cracked open with a glowing light slipping around the edges. I chewed on my bottom lip, pushing the door open. “Lena?”

“In here.” Her voice was raspy, a touch above a whisper.

I nudged the door open to reveal a elegant library that didn’t fit the overall esthetic of her modern penthouse. The walls were nothing but bookcases, filled to the brim with books and odd knick knacks. I stood in awe as Pepper skipped towards the middle of the room where a fireplace sat, a roaring fire warming the room in a way that beckoned me further inside.

“Pepper! We’re going to have to talk about boundaries and running into rooms without checking the fatal funnel.” I shook my head, looking to the left where the little dog had run to. I felt my heart skip and tumbled to the bottom of my gut at what I saw.

Lena sat on the floor in front of the fire, bundled up in a duvet pulled from her bed. A half empty bottle of whisky sat next to her, a glass with three fingers of the amber liquid sat in her hand. The orange glow of the fire caught her eyes, turning them into burning emeralds. Pepper had crawled into her lap, nudging her little head under Lena’s free hand, desperate to get Lena to pet her.  Lena swallowed hard, looking down, lifting her hand. I saw the dried tear tracks on her cheeks as another fresh tear blinked free. “I like your sweatshirt, Pepper.” Pepper woofed, nudging her nose against Lena’s hand until she finally broke down the walls, snuggling her way into Lena’s touch.

I wanted to break down and cry at the sight. “Um, she heard you were alumni and demanded I get her a sweatshirt.” I took a few steps, afraid to startle Lena. “The shelter told me you’d stopped by almost everyday, checking on Pepper. Leaving her food, a clean blanket. They also told me they received a large anonymous donation yesterday. Enough to keep them open for years.”

Lena closed her eyes, lifting the glass of whisky to her lips, taking a sip. “MIT. That’s where I got my first degree. The first doctorate. Only took me eight months to blow through the courses. I was set to fall into a partnership with an old friend, building rocket ships.” She paused, her words slightly slurred as she spoke. “Then Harvard medical. I was a medical doctor in ten months. Did half a rotation, then Lex started playing with bombs.” She hummed, looking down at Pepper. “Then Lillian. The trial. The testifying and sitting in windowless rooms with federal agents, proving I was the only sane Luthor in the world.” She drank the rest of the glass in one shot, setting the glass down heavily next to the bottle. “I ran away from that right into following you. Following you in hopes of finding repent, hope, and all that bullshit.” She chuckled, tugging the duvet over her shoulders. “Everything was my fault. And yet I ran and ran and ran the fastest I could to avoid the guilt to catch up and run me over.” She opened her eyes as more tears fell. “All it took was a breath filled with jealousy and I collapse like I was made of tissue. I stopped, and the world slammed into me like a runaway train, demolishing me.”

I clenched my jaw, moving to sit facing her on the floor. I reached for the whisky bottle, when she turned towards it. “I’m not done with it.” Her voice was rough, as if she was accusing me of taking it away from her.

I nodded. “I know.” I poured one more finger in her empty glass, holding it out to her as I took a shot right from the bottle, I hummed at the expensive, rich burn of the whisky. “The one thing I’ve learned over the years, some conversations need liquid courage. The lubrication to speak freely and open all of the boxes we keep locked up.” I turned the bottle around, the label announcing it was an old whisky, one from the best part of Ireland. I smiled when I recognized the label, blinking back my own tears. “When I found out you were Irish, I bought this bottle for you. Cost me three paychecks and a interest free loan from Winn. I thought it would remind you of home every time you drank it.”

“It reminded me of you.” Lena twirled the glass in her hands. “It’s the same bottle. I kept it. Open it when I wanted to forget and only think of a time when I had you.” She shook her head, swallowing hard. “I never drank more than a sip, until today. I reached for it without a second thought when I got home. I was saving it.” She laughed through sniffles. “And what do I do? I drink half of it like a sloppy college freshman.”

“If you were still a sloppy college freshman, you’d be passed out on the floor after two shots.” I licked my lips, taking another shot. “Lena.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know, Kara. I don’t have answers. I don’t know how not to be jealous whenever anyone casts a look your way. I don’t know who I’m supposed to be now. I don’t know how to stop slowly. I’ve run for so long, I don’t know.” She turned to look at me, her eyes red from crying for hours. “it’s like someone kicked the ladder out from me and I’m holding on with my fingertips.”

“Then let go.” I scooted closer. “Let go. There’s no reason to hold on anymore, Lena. I’m here. I’m yours, and whatever the past was, I’m not letting it be the direction of our future.” I gently took the glass from her hand, setting it down before I grabbed her hand. Tugging her towards me. “Let go. Stop and let go. Drop everything you’ve been carrying and let it shatter to the floor, let me carry some of the pieces. We’ll put them all back together, better than before.”

Lena’s face scrunched up as a sob broke free. She collapsed into my arms, clawing at my shirt as the dam broke and ten years of weight poured out with her tears. I held her, kissing the top of her head, softly crying with her.

Ten years of punishment was enough for the both of us. We both had to let go before we started anew.

XXX

Lena

The soft sound of the firewood cracking as it burned warmth into my office, woke me from a groggy slumber. I blinked, feeling the weight of my duvet and a raging headache. I closed my eyes, shifting to move when I felt something soft and fluffy brush my hand. I cocked an eye open to the sight of Pepper snuggled against my arm, sleeping with a mission, cradled in the crook of my elbow. I smiled, delicately moving my arm from waking her up as I went to sit up. A bad idea the second I was upright. The raging headache rushed into a pounding jackhammer on my skull. I clutched my forehead, trying to gather my bearings. I remembered starting the fire when I got home, the rest was fuzzy around the edges.

“I think she loves you more than me.” I turned to Kara’s soft voice as she walked into the room, carrying a glass of water and plates full of pizza. “I couldn’t get her to budge when I laid you on the couch. Just curled up against you, watching over you as you slept.” She cocked an eyebrow at the sleeping dog. “I will have to talk to her about sleeping on the job.”

I hummed, forcing a smile as I took the water Kara handed me, dropping two white pills in my hand. “Dare I ask how much I drank?” I spotted the whisky bottle back on the shelf with my other treasured collection of alcohol.

“It’s probably better if we left that as a mystery.” Kara sat on the edge of the coffee table between the couch and fireplace. She held up the plate of pizza. “I got pizza. I was starving and nothing beats greasy pizza as a hangover cure.”

I smiled when I saw the veggie pizza sitting on top of the triple cheese with double pepperoni and pineapple. “Can I have one of those?” I motioned to Kara’s slices.

Kara grinned, chuckling. “I knew I should’ve bypassed the veggie. You always broke your vegetables are a must rule, when you drank a little too much.” She switched plates, handing it to me. “How are you feeling?” I saw the serious question in the smile on her face.

“Like shit? I don’t think Claire had this in mind when she told me to watch sad movies and drink wine. I replayed my own sad movies and drank a five hundred dollar bottle of whisky like a fish.” I took a bite of pizza, sighing with content at the taste.

“Eat up. The grease will do you good.” Kara laughed, leaning forward to devour a piece of veggie pizza.

I smiled, taking another bite as the silence fell between us. I still had so much trapped inside of me, even as I poured out years of pent up fears, there was more. I’d never stopped from the moment I walked away from Kara. I just kept going. Surviving off glimmers of hope. Drinking the drops of what if, and when I finally collected enough, I had no idea what to do with the overflowing cup. I had righted all the wrongs my family created. I was my own woman with my own projects, my own money, my own desires, and my own life ahead of me. I had freedom.

I glanced at Kara. I had her. The goofy blonde teaching her little dog how to sit up for a scrap of crust, grinning like the first day I met her. Kara looked at me, pushing her glasses up, clapping when Pepper sat up.

“I have you.” The words came out a half whisper, lighting my heart with a thousand different emotions. So many I couldn’t put my finger on just one for the moment.

Kara blushed, fidgeting with her glasses. “Did you want more pizza? I ordered two larges. Nothing beats cold pizza for phase two of a hangover.” She stood up, reaching for my empty plate.

I gently grabbed her wrist, her heart racing against my fingertips. My heart skipped, synching with hers in the second beat. I looked down, letting the moment swallow me. “I have you.” I spoke it louder, stronger. Convincing myself that I could stop and not lose anything I wanted to keep. And God, did I want Kara. I looked up her, her big blues eyes searching mine with worry. “I have you, Kara.” I pressed my fingers against her pulse, feeling the way she loved me. Still loved me.

“Always. Anywhere. Everywhere. Whenever. You have me, Lena. I’ll always be here.” She leaned forward, brushing her lips against mine. “Right by your side, forever.” She kissed me softly, smiling at the taste of greasy pizza and expensive whisky. She leaned back, licking her lips. “Hold that thought?”

I nodded, feeling flush with a racing heart. She disappeared with our empty plates, Pepper trailing behind her with hopeful hops. I let out a slow breath, tugging at the edges of the duvet as I stared at the fireplace. I felt dizzy. Not from the building hangover, but the feeling of letting go of the lead weights I kept tethered around my ankles.

I knew I’d still be jealous of those who flirted with Kara. I’d worry about her, her nightmares and what telling her stories would do to her PTSD. I was still worried I wasn’t raised with love as a tangible life lesson. But I had her. I had Kara and in the middle of my office, swollen eyes, massive headache and building acid reflux, I finally accepted I would always have her. We’d made it through the last ten years, always circling back to graze one another, never to land. We finally landed. I had her. She had me. I smiled, burying my face in the soft fabric, my body begging for me to lay down and sleep off the whisky and grease. I laughed, blinking away another round of tears. Happy ones this time. I reached for my phone, texting Claire a simple, you were right. Crying and booze was the answer. Laughing when she sent a I told you so, tell me everything in the morning.

I swiped out of my messages, avoiding the emails piling up in my inbox, setting the phone face down on the coffee table, when Kara appeared, sitting on the edge of the table. She held a small deep green jewelry box with gold trimming. I gasped silently at the sight, opening my mouth to speak when Kara cut me off.

“I know beyond knowing, this isn’t the proper time. It isn’t the most romantic and nothing like I planned, but I’ve learned over the years, planning is for the boring.” She ran her thumb along the edge of the box. “And maybe I’m not really asking right now, maybe I’m just showing you that in the moments you lose your way. Or when you forget to stop, and you see me hugging another brilliant, beautiful doctor friend, you’ll look down and know. I’m yours. Have been from the moment you helped me pick up ballpoint pens off the campus floor store.” She paused, blowing out a steady breath as her hands shook as she spun the box around. “I carried this with me no matter where I went. Which, when I look back, was really stupid of me. I could’ve lost it a million times over, and yet, it always made it through. I always woke up and found it sitting in the bottom of a rusted tin. Reminding me.” She took another deep breath, flicking the box open towards her. “Lena, I have no clue what comes next. In ten years, I’ve always known the next step. The next trip, the next journey. I always took the longest road away from home, scared of looking back. Scared of what I would find if I did look back.” She paused again, chewing on her bottom lip. “But home was always you.” She looked up at me, a soft smile on her face. She turned the box around. The emerald ring sat in a new bed of blue velvet, sparkling brighter than the last time I saw it on Kara’s kitchen floor. “I’m tired of carrying this around with me.”

I felt the tears slip down my cheek. “Kara.”

She shrugged, looking down at the ring in her hands. “The other night, when I got jealous. I realized jealousy was a stupid emotion. I love you, Lena, so much. I’ve never loved anyone like you, no matter how hard the world tried to break me, I would just push back.” She tugged the ring free from the box. “I pushed back knowing in the morning I would still love you more than anything, no matter how hard I fought it. I’d always be yours in the morning.” She tipped her head up at the ceiling, her thumb running along the band. “I was always yours.” Her eyes met mine, watery with tears and emotion. “I’m not asking right now.”

“Why not?” I blurted the words out, covering my mouth at how loud and fast I spoke. I cleared my throat. “What if I want to ask you?” I shook my head, remembering the less than extravagant ring I bought for her was stolen from my office in Brooklyn, three days before my life completely changed. I didn’t think twice. It was a silly diamond ring with no character, and when the world fell apart, I never cared to file a police report, or an insurance claim. I didn’t have Kara then, I didn’t need a ring to remind me of what I lost. Then it dawned on me, in my post hangover haze. The other ring. The other ring I had made when I inherited my family's fortune. The one sitting in the top drawer of my desk where I last set it after feebly presenting it to Kara at the dog shelter. “What if I want to ask you? What if I want you to ask me?” I glanced towards the hallway, not trusting my worn out body to run across and grab it. Never mind the fact I was suddenly frightened this was all a fever dream, born out of excessive drinking. "What if? There's so many what if’s." My voice trembled as I stared at the ring in her fingers. A thousand fears melding with a thousand memories of the past.

Kara scrunched her brow together, thinking for a minute. She smiled, her hands shaking. “What if I want to ask you to take this ring only if you think you want to. What if I want you to take this ring, and what if I want to ask you to believe me that I’m yours forever, and maybe I want to ask you to be mine forever?” Her hands shook as she reached for my left hand.

I covered her hand with mine. “Maybe I want to be your forever, Kara. And maybe I want you to believe I’m your forever. Kismet be damned, you’ve always been my one. The one I want to be with since the day I met you. You’ve always been what I wanted. What I needed, Kara.” I looked at the ring in her other hand. “Yes.”

Kara grinned. “Yes?”

“Yes.” I slid my hand free from atop of hers, my heart pounding against my ribs as Kara slipped the ring on my finger. “A thousand times, yes.”

Kara pressed the ring against my finger, blinking away tears as she looked at me. “I’ve only ever lived for you, Lena.”

I cut her off, kissing her harder than ever before. She slid her hands across my sides, pulling me closer into her as we kissed. I felt a few more broken pieces slip back into place, lifting the pain of years past, replacing it with the way it felt to be loved, and to love back like this. I leaned back, wiping the tears from Kara’s face. I grinned at the ring on my finger. Kara glanced at it, pulling my hand down to wind in hers. “That ring has seen some things, been through some things. Take care of it. It’s been my battle buddy for ten years.” She frowned playfully, reaching to tug it off. “You know what, maybe I should…”

I pulled my hand back, soundly kissing her. “Don’t you dare, Kara Danvers. Least eligible bachelorette of National City. You’re officially off the market.” I ran my fingers over the blank spot on her left ring finger. “First thing tomorrow. I’m putting a ring here. I don’t care if it’s a paper ring, or a twist tie. I’ll get a black marker if I have to, write LL on there.” I looked at her. “Forever.”

Kara grinned, kissing the corner of my mouth before resting her forehead on mine. “Forever.”

I closed my eyes, when I heard Pepper trot into the room, barking at us. Kara turned to look at her, laughing at the giant stuffed potsticker I’d bought her, hanging from her mouth. “Of course. Lena, you have to stop spoiling our fur baby. She’ll never listen to me if you spoil her rotten, I can’t be the strict mom.”

I laughed with her, leaning into Kara. “Just today. Tomorrow, tomorrow is a whole new day.” I grinned at her.

“It is, but tomorrow is also Wednesday and the first full staff meeting for the launch of my series for the magazine. You have to be there.” She looked at the ring, her smile fading. “People will talk.”

“Let’s worry about that tomorrow. Right now, I just want to sit with you. Stop and sit with you as we eat cold pizza and talk about the things this ring has seen. We can stop today, Kara.” I ran my hand against her cheek, pulling her attention back to me. “Let’s just stop for now.” I motioned towards the kitchen. “I have ice cream.”

Kara’s eyes lit up. “Rocky road?”

“Of course.”

Kara giggled, sweeping me into her arms and carried me to the kitchen where she sat me down, rambling about how rocky road was another great hangover. I sat and watched her, glancing at the ring every so often. My heart beating faster and faster. I wanted to stop today, and live in this moment forever. This is what I spent ten years chasing. I had it and I could stop for a few hours before I started again. Started again with Kara by my side.