Hey folks, here's a little thing I wrote. It's small and it's sweet and it wouldn't leave my brain until I put it down on paper, so now that it's out here, hopefully my brain will let me get back to studying for finals.
This will also be posted to AO3 under my pseudonym mts and you can find me on tumblr at my-life-as-molly if you wanna chat.
Thanks to Kate for the editorial assist.
Without further ado, please enjoy!
Alex is surrounded suddenly, not by water, but by air and she's sputtering, gasping for breath. And then there are arms on her, arms around her, a body beneath her own, lifting her up. Kara. And Maggie.
"You held on." Maggie's voice is filled with awe and admiration and gratitude.
Shuddering, Alex manages to gasp out, "I held on," as if she's not quite sure she believes it herself.
Alex feels Maggie's rib cage expand and contract with each breath she takes and uses it to try to regulate her own breathing. Kara grips her left hand in a vice and Maggie rocks them back and forth, cupping Alex's head with a hand against her ear. She places gentle kisses on the crown of Alex's head, pulling her ever closer into her chest and all Alex can hear is the thrum of Maggie's heart beating.
She is vaguely aware that J'onn and Vasquez have arrived on the scene and would normally be embarrassed to be caught in such a compromising position. But today, Maggie's steady 1-2-1-2-1-2 is all that matters, echoing through her waterlogged skull, coaxing her into unconsciousness.
Alex Danvers has always taken comfort in sequences of rules, of ideas, of numbers. The rhythmic sequence beating in her girlfriend's chest has quickly become a favorite, a touchstone that keeps her grounded in reality.
She comes to rely on it as something of a lullaby. Whereas before Malvern Alex could fall asleep anywhere, now she has trouble if she lays her head anywhere but Maggie's chest. The 1-2-1-2-1-2 lullaby becomes a part of their nightly routine, right after Maggie finishes perusing the recipes section of the latest Better Homes and Gardens for dinner ideas and Alex finally puts down the old bio engineering journal she's been rereading and annotating for weeks.
They kiss and they reach over to shut off each bedside lamp, and Maggie opens her arms for Alex to slide into, ear falling directly on top of Maggie's heart, leg strewn gently over her lower torso. Maggie cups the open ear, ensuring the echo-y beat is all Alex can hear; not Malvern or the rushing water or her own racing thoughts. Just the 1-2-1-2-1-2.
Alex has never felt safer than she does in these moments and she thinks this must be what Kara feels all the time. She's never allowed herself to be this vulnerable, but she finds herself curling into Maggie at game night, at movie night, and she learns that being vulnerable is okay, at least around Maggie and Kara and their friends.
But it becomes something of a problem in public. See, in public, Alex likes to give off an air of control and power and certainty to the rest of the world, a finely crafted image of perfection. Alex Danvers is nothing short of invincible. But all too often these days, she finds herself feeling afraid and impotent and doubtful, and this is decidedly not the image she intends for the world to see. Nothing calms her in those moments quite like the song of Maggie's heart beating its steady 1-2-1-2-1-2 tune.
But it's not exactly feasible for Alex to put her ear to Maggie's chest whenever she wants to; Alex is so much taller than her petite girlfriend and they would just look a little too silly for comfort. So Alex settles for holding Maggie's wrist between her own thumb and fingers, measuring the pulses of blood running through her girlfriend's veins, timing the surges in her head.
1-2-1-2-1-2.
The throbbing pressure beneath Alex's for and middle finger promises Alex that she's alive, that she's held on long enough, that Maggie and Kara made it to her in time, that all those firsts Maggie was talking about can and will happen. It's not much, but it's somehow also everything.
And that's more than enough for Alex Danvers.