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sssammich · 3 months

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ficlet: in pursuit of calm, lena/kelly

rarepair time, the superior guardiancorp edition.

born out of this headcanon and some chats with @sideguitars because why not LOL

anyway here you go, have fun!

There are four three things at this moment that Lena knows to be true:

There is a flickering bulb in her lamp desk that she hasn’t asked Jess to fix yet. She should, it’s been three days. But she keeps getting distracted that she forgets and then she walks away from her desk only to come back, turn it back on, and have it flicker randomly in her face.

Her coffee is tepid. Because she keeps getting distracted and she forgets and then she walks away from her desk only to come back, lift the mug to her lips, and taste the liquid be anything less than the perfect temperature.

Andrea texts her that she just picked Kelly up from the airport. Kelly, the woman who Lena left in Metropolis becaus Lena couldn’t be the one to get left behind. Kelly, the woman who has not escaped Lena’s mind since she left for National City. Kelly, the woman who just came back from her last and final deployment, and who’s in town to visit their mutual friend. Kelly, the woman who she never stopped loving, not even once.

Lena has no idea what to do with this information.

She purses her lips, her body sagging uncharacteristically in her office chair.

“Jess,” she says finally, pushing herself up after signaling to to call her assistant.

“Yes, Miss Luthor?”

“Reschedule the rest of my meetings for the day. I need to be somewhere.”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line, no doubt Jess trying to look at her packed calendar and troubleshooting this complete derailment on their day.

“Of course, Miss Luthor,” Jess responds eventually. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

"She looks at the flickering bulb on her lamp and flips the switch to turn it off. “No. That’ll be all.”

Lena considers going to the nearest bar. She considers going to the park for some fresh air. She considers a list of many other destinations she could be driving herself to. Yet where she ends up is to double park in front of Andrea’s penthouse knowing who is up there with Andrea.

She imagines soft dark skin. Black hair pulled into a tight bun. The gentle slope of a nose. The perfect cupid’s bow of her lips. The cute mole above those very lips.

More than anything, though, Lena imagines a kind smile and kinder eyes.

Her reverie is interrupted by a honk behind her, a car urging her to move out of the way.

She glances up the highrise apartment building before she drives home, instead.

She does not get a lot of sleep that night. She wished she did, hoping the three refills of scotch she consumed during dinner—nevermind that she had such little appetite for any of said dinner—would have lulled her to sleep by now.

Instead, she recalls the time before.

They were circling one another, working up to something. Until, of course, Kelly had gotten a call, one that deployed her far too soon for either of their liking. The U.S. Army reminding them that Kelly’s schedule wasn’t yet her own.

Which meant that it wasn’t yet Lena’s own, either.

Restless, she gives up on sleeping and instead walks out into the bathed darkness of her empty penthouse, the slivers of light from the waning moon coming through her living room window.

She does not know what to make of Kelly’s arrival in National City. Lena had left her old life in Metropolis, thinking that she’d left Kelly there, too. Yet now, here they were. The closest they had been in 18 months.

Lena taps her phone screen on and unlocks it before scrolling through her photos until she reached the last image the two of them took: side by side at the gun range in front of Lena’s shooting target, all bullseyes. Kelly’s lips are on her cheek, and the smile on Lena’s face is one she hasn’t seen since.

It’s…the happiest she’d ever seen herself in a long time. Mostly because this was the day before it all came crashing down on them.

She shuts her phone screen off and trudges to the kitchen to get herself a cup of water, drinking it in slight desperation that a droplet of two escapes the corner of her mouth and slips down her chin.

She wipes her face and wipes the water, though as her fingers meet her skin, it surprises her even more to find an errant tear having cascaded down her face.

Lena returns to work. She is business as usual. She goes through her meetings. She puts annoying shareholders in their place. She does not look to her phone for messages from a certain someone. She visits her lab. She talks with her R&D team. She fights the urge to message first.

The rest of the week goes much the same, an exercise in self-control. Or so she says.

By Friday evening, she is alone in her office having pushed Jess out the door knowing that her assistant has a date and should go have fun.

“Before I go, there was this one last message that came through just a little while ago. I apologize for missing it. It must have dropped from the pile.”

Lena waves her off and accepts the sticky note graciously, the sticky part on the back a little tacky against her finger.

She waits until Jess leaves before she reads it. Lucky thing, too, when she realizes what the message is and who it’s from.

She checks her watch before rushing out of her office, haphazardly pawing at her lamp to turn it off.

She enters the restaurant, giving a name she hasn’t uttered in 18 months to the host before walking behind him. When he steps aside, Lena finds her sitting, waiting. Like she expected Lena to show up. Like she was so sure.

She hates her a little bit for it, if she’s being honest. But Lena finds it’s hard to deny her.

“Lena,” she says, her voice a dulcet tone, having been absent from Lena’s ears for so, so long.

“Hi.”

Kelly pushes her chair back slightly and stands, her posture perfect even while at ease, and approaches Lena. She allows her, of course, mostly because she’s rooted in her spot. Kelly then leans forward slightly, but pauses to see if Lena will stop her. She won’t, of course, and leans herself, allowing Kelly’s lips to press upon her cheek.

“I’m glad you came.”

“I was surprised to see your message with my assistant.”

Kelly grins a little, tilting her head slightly. “I didn’t want to assume, that’s all.”

18 months ago they had a similar dinner, but instead of catching up, they were breaking up. Or, rather, they were reaching the conclusion of a relationship that never truly began, at least formally. Lena had been a goner since the day they’d met at the shooting range just shy of four months before that. She’d wanted to get some lessons in and found Kelly at one of the stations hitting her target with precision. Lena had been impressed, but when Kelly glanced at her and offered a polite smile, Lena immediately wanted to know her name.

“You’re fine. So, tell me. How have you been?” she asks, leaning forward, her eyes never straying from that beautiful face. Not like Lena had a choice, really.

Kelly tells her, glossing over what Lena knows are gorier and harder details about her deployment. She can only fathom the terrors of war that Kelly has to carry inside of her, just hidden beneath a radiating smile.

In turn, she talks about her move to National City. About L-Corp. About the life she’s been living, angling her words just enough so as not to touch any of her sadness, of her heartbreak she’s been nursing for almost two years. If only because she knows that Kelly knows, that Kelly seems to be nursing the same thing.

They close the restaurant down and the two of them walk quietly out into the gray darkness of the evening, highlighted only by the lampposts of the sidewalk.

“Are you back for good?” she asks, the question having sat on the tip of her tongue since Lena first heard of her arrival.

Kelly smiles, her face a little solemn, but her smile still shining. “Yes.”

She nods, processes this information for all that it is, and perhaps all that it could be. Kelly reaches forward with her hand, her palm open for Lena to take, if she chose. She never forgot this—never forgot Kelly’s patience for her, for the type of call and response that’s only theirs.

She closes the gap, Lena's hand clasping with hers.

“Can I see you again? I’d like for someone to show me around the city.”

“Why not ask Andrea?” she asks, testing.

Kelly studies her, those dark chocolate eyes always reading her, reading through her, knowing her. “Andrea is lovely, but I’d like to try and catch up on all that I’ve missed, if that’s possible.”

Lena regards her, but Kelly presses on.

“Is it?”

“What?”

“Possible.”

Lena has a choice here. Kelly has always given her a choice, and is waiting until Lena makes one.

Finally, she nods.

She releases Kelly’s hand but not before giving it a meaningful squeeze. As Kelly walks away with a final wave, Lena thinks of four three things:

There’s still a lamp bulb that needs fixing that she really needs to talk to Jess about come Monday morning.

Tomorrow, she thinks she’ll visit the shooting range again.

The sight of Kelly has slowly unraveled her in the last few days, yet her heart is peacefully beating in her heart, calm and steady.

She has no idea what to do with this information, but she thinks she doesn’t mind finding out.

#samfic #the superior guardiancorp #lena x kelly #just some tender angst #you know me #it's a love story #as always #supergirl #lena luthor #kelly olsen

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