Until Next Time?

It’s nearly 11pm on a Thursday when Alex gets a knock on her door. She’s resigns herself to the fact that she’s only getting older as she huffs whilst getting up from her bed. Another knock. She shuffles to the door. The incessant knocking comes again.

“Alright, alright, I’m coming!” She yells. “Not all of us have super speed, you know.” She mutters, just in case it isn’t who she thinks it is.

“11pm. It’s 11pm, Kara.” Alex starts as she opens the door, “Are you…are you vibrating on the spot?” Kara, vibrating with pure joy, has a 500Watt grin as she pulls out a piece of paper from behind her back and waves it in front of her sister.

“Maybe keep it still so I can actually read it?” 

Alex scans the page quickly and then matches her sister’s smile with one of her own.

“Oh my God, Kara, congrats! This is so exciting! Come in! Come in, we have to celebrate!” She announces and rushes to the kitchen to find some sort of celebratory drink.

“I only have peach schnapps…or…some of that weird aniseed drink I got from Greece that’s, like, 70%.” Kara raises an eyebrow, giving her a look.

“Peach schnapps it is.”

Kara takes the drink, grateful that it will affect her in no way whatsoever and she can actually appreciate the taste.

“Look at you! My little sister all grown up. You have a real job just out of college. Quite an achievement these days.” Alex teases.

“It’s just a temporary thing. Zero hours contract and no sick pay…not that I’ll need it, but I do need money.” Kara replies, “Anyway, you have a more important job, better pay and you’ve had it for a while. Not that you ever show me around…” she adds with a challenging smirk.

“You don’t need to see my job. It might be important, but it’s boring…Besides, you'll be too busy serving at only the finest of establishments with the most important clients.” Alex mocks in a posh voice (Kara notices the quick change of subject, but knows when not to push).

“Sorry, sis, I’m gonna be hanging out with only the elite now.” She jokes, feigning hurt when Alex responds by hitting her lightly on the shoulder.

“You joke now, but I bet you’ll find some young, eligible bachelor with new money to pay for your lavish, Kryptonian lifestyle.”

“Oh please, as if I need anymore reason to feel more alien than I am. I’m just glad I have a normal job so I can lead a normal life. For once…I can actually fit in.” She swirls her drink round in the glass. 

For the first time this evening she feels somber, reflecting on the life she once had and could never have again. It’d be better this way. To just stay ordinary and live like the rest of them. Like a human.

“Hey, I know you can do this,” Alex smiles gently, places a hand on her sister’s shoulder and gives it a small squeeze, “and, in order to break you into your new job, you can get me another one of these, waitress.” The smile turns into a teasing smirk as she waves her glass around.

“You’re the worst.” Kara rolls her eyes, but gets her another.

“Alright, listen up! I know for most of you this is your first time doing this kinda thing, but its not too hard…As long as you listen to everything I say.” A young woman announces, clearly in charge of the evening’s event, standing on a small stage at the top of the room.

“This is just a simple reception, but it’s got some esteemed V.I.P guests, some of whom you will recognise, so no selfies please. We’re here to do a job.” This earns a few snickers.

“Now, some of you will serve canapés, I’ll go through the list of ingredients to those of you assigned to that. Some will do drinks trays. It’s only champagne tonight, so if anyone asks for anything else just direct them to the bar and Karl over there can tell them either ‘No’ or ‘Ok, fine, but just for you’.” Karl gives a wave and rolls his eyes. "The rest will either be topping up drinks or clearing. I’ll move some of you from the trays to do top ups once there are more people looking to get wasted.”

Once the woman (Gina, her name-tag read) finished the briefing she assigned each person a role. Kara is called up to do a drinks tray, to which she gives a nervous smile (“Don’t worry, honey, if it gets too heavy I’ll ask someone else to take over.” Gina offers encouragingly, not realising that Kara might be more prone to tripping over and spilling the tray entirely). She stands by the door to the room with a full tray of champagne glasses and tries to settle her nerves before guests arrive.

Kara took stock of the room around her so she at least knew the layout. Fewer opportunities to trip if she knew where every carpet and chair leg was. 

As she looks around the room she’s immediately struck by how long it is. It appears to go on for miles and the small stage is right at the very end. Extravagant furniture has been scattered around the place and the curved ornate leg chairs were perfect for catching shoelaces on.

The wooden floor was polished, gleaming and spotless for tonight’s event. Modern paintings hung dotted along the walls and there were few tables around the place. It looked quite bare, but not for long.

Soon guests are pouring in, most of them taking drinks. It’s not long before Kara has to go and get another tray and this seems to go on for some time. After a while she’s been told by Gina to go and top up people’s drinks.

At first it’s nice to just wander around and offer people top ups. They either decline politely or seem excited by the fact they’re getting more alcohol. But then it becomes a chore. She can tell she keeps offering it to the same people and really hopes her asking the same thing again and again doesn’t annoy them.

Kara likes to think that as well as her obvious powers she also possesses an innate ability to understand what other people are feeling or thinking, especially if they feel the same way as her. It doesn’t always work, but on occasion it does seem to appear conveniently. 

In this particular instance, she can tell that the other people doing the same job as her seem to understand that no-one else really wants a top up at this point and they’re simply drifting around with a champagne bottle. She takes this time to do the same.

“Um, excuse me, but why haven’t you offered me any champagne?” One particularly stuck-up man asks. He looks to be quite young, one of those New Money types, Kara assumes. He's a little drunk- probably where his brave snobbery comes from.

“Sorry, sir, here you go.” She goes to pour him some but not before he takes his glass away, making the liquid spill onto the floor.

“I wanted you to ask me, not just pour me some. God, you people never listen.” He walks away with his snooty friends, all of them snickering. It takes all of Kara’s considerable strength to not just punch the guy half way across the room. Instead she sighs and focuses her energy on cleaning up the small mess.

“Tiresome, isn’t it? I mean for goodness-sake who do these people think they are?” Kara hears a woman say from above her as she’s cleaning up with some paper towel on the floor.

“E-excuse me?” Kara asks timidly.

“That man. He just wasted half a bottle of champagne to play a stupid joke on you,” comes the answer, “-and only because he thinks he’s better than you.”

“Not quite half a bottle, more like…a quarter…an eighth really," she says, standing up and putting the paper towel in the bin.

The woman laughs, “I may be another guest but you really don’t have to defend the likes of that man to me. I’m not like him.” She smiles and Kara blushes.

She gets her first proper look at the woman. She looks a little older than Kara, with black hair, sharp green eyes and a red painted smile. It takes Kara by surprise that this woman would even acknowledge her, let alone start a conversation with her. It takes Kara even more by surprise when she realises she’s just been staring at the woman for a solid minute.

“I’m uh…I’m sorry, I have to get back to work.” Kara starts to walk away, a little dazed by the whole ordeal.

“Don’t let me stop you.” The woman says following her.

“Don’t you want to mingle?”

“What, with these people? These stuck up, rich, pompous jerks? No thank you. I think I’ve had quite enough of that for tonight.”

Kara stops.

"Not to be rude, but…well…aren’t you one of those rich people?” She tries to pick her words carefully, but realises it doesn’t come out quite as she intended.

The woman doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, she smiles at the comment. “The only reason I’m here is because of my family. I’d much rather not come to these sorts of things but,” she waves her hand about, vaguely, “family duty or whatever.”

“Ah, I see.” Kara understood a little. She'd had to attend a vast array of Kryptonian events when she was younger that she wasn’t fond of, just because of her family’s status. She continues to walk around with the woman beside her.

“Would you like some more?” Kara offers the mystery woman. “You seem to be following me around after all. Or is there another reason? Canapés are by the fire exit over there."

“No, my reason is that you don’t make me want to jump out a window, unlike most people here.” She pauses, “but yes, I’ll have a top up. Thank you."

They continue like this for the rest of the evening, Kara casually topping up and the woman complaining about most of the guests in the room. On occasion Kara would offer the woman some more drink and, on occasion, she’d accept.

Just like that, it was time for the guests to leave. Kara was surprised by how quickly the time went by and she wasn't the only one.

“That went a lot faster than it usually does.” The woman announced. "Looks like you can get rid of me. Aren’t you lucky?” She smirks.

This isn’t the first time the woman has made a small, but unmistakable, self-deprecating remark and Kara can’t understand why. After all, she's been kind, funny, and smart the whole evening…

Oh, she was meant to say something, not just stand there staring at her again.

“Well, you certainly made the time pass quicker.” She finally says.

“You charmer.”

“That’s me.”

“Until next time…?” The woman says, giving Kara a chance to offer up her name.

“Kara, my name’s Kara…Danvers.”

“Nice to meet you Kara. I’m Lena. Lena Luthor."

And off she walks, as if she hadn’t just changed Kara’s world.

A Luthor.

Of course…

She’s a Luthor.