A/N: So many things to note for this one. First and foremost, it's the perk for reaching the $100 donation mark in the girls inc fundraiser page I created for #IStandWithCandicePatton - and thus the only reason I'm making an exception to post westallen now, as opposed to a couple weeks from now (since I was planning to have June be my month of writing other Flash ships besides westallen). Second is this idea was inspired solely from my lovely friend and beta, sendtherain, (who yes, also beta'd this one - thank you!). She's currently in constant fangirl mode over choi taek & sung deok sun from Answer Me 1988 (kdrama) and showed me a scene of them that I tried to mirror in this fic, b/c it seemed PERFECT for a canon divergent pilot fic. I hope you guys enjoy it! It was fun to write, and imo is very cute. Please tell me your thoughts!

Side note: Iris is not with Eddie in this fic. That's why he's never mentioned. The scene where Barry & Iris nearly get hit by a car was not tense. They were just hanging out again. I don't explicitly say that, but that's how it was. Everything before that scene is how it was to the tee in the pilot, and everything after up until Barry is running to see Oliver. After that it diverges and all else can be forgotten from that ep b/c I threw it out the window. lmao.

Again, thanks to sendtherain for beta'ing. :)

*I own nothing. No copyright infringement intended.

Iris West bit her lip and tried to relax in the chair adjacent to the couch in Barry's living room. She tried not to stare at him as he vibrated different parts of his body, sometimes accidentally, sometimes intentionally. Usually his wide-eyed expression would give him away, but discerning between surprise at his abilities and shock at displaying them accidentally was actually more difficult than she'd thought it would be.

Super speed.

Who would've thought?

A particle accelerator, a mass of floating chemicals, a lightning strike, and a coma… Nine months later, and her best friend had woken up with super speed.

It had taken him a little while to explain to her why he was so agitated over little things that seemed to be perfectly normal around her, but inevitably were very different to him. Or at least they would have been if he hadn't sensed the outcome and diverted them from happening. The concept itself was as overwhelming to her as it was to him.

She was glad he had told her. It must've been terrifying waking up that way – though he did say he hadn't realized what was happening until after they reunited. She wondered why that was, stifling down the reluctant boost it gave her ego that she'd more or less activated her best friend's super powers.

Dr. Wells – the man Barry had admired for years – had a whole lot to say to him about his new powers and what he should be doing with them, as did the two people who had remained loyal to him despite the assault he'd faced from the media and the public by essentially throwing the city into panic with his failed particle accelerator. To their credit, Barry said they were less overbearing than the man who flat out told him he couldn't be a hero just because he had super speed – that he needed to only use it to be studied for scientific purposes. As if he were nothing more than a lab rat to be tested on.

It made her furious just thinking about it, and equally bitter when she remembered how her dad had lashed out at Barry for still believing his father hadn't murdered his mother, for insisting that there were others like him. 'Metahumans' – people who had gained powers following the particle accelerator explosion.

In times like these they only had each other.

He'd been halfway to Star City, which confused her, but she didn't press as to why. Instead she offered to listen if he needed to talk, and he nearly crumbled on the other end. She wished they had been in the same place, so she can hold him.

And then they were.

He was in front of her in the home they grew up in, and her mouth was hanging open in disbelief, a million questions racing through her mind, when he answered them all in one fell swoop.

"I have super speed."

He dashed across the room one, two, three times, so she'd believe him, but he didn't have to. She would've believed him if he told her he could fly. Though it was certainly nice to have proof.

"The coma?" she'd asked.

He nodded. "The coma, the lightning…" he trailed off, and then proceeded to tell her everything that had happened throughout the day.

He wanted to do good with these powers, to make a difference – her Barry, of course he did.

But people who didn't really know him or didn't believe in him kept telling him what to do. It made him want to run and never look back.

He probably wouldn't have run forever, he assured her. Which she told herself she should be comforted by. He'd been on his way to Star City because there was someone there he thought he could seek counsel from. Someone he'd met when he'd been there on assignment.

Again, she didn't ask who. He would tell her when he was ready.

When he was finished talking, he stopped pacing, stared right at her and waited for her to respond. She hoped he wasn't expecting rejection, but she didn't make him wait long. She could hear his heavy breathing from across the room.

She licked her lips, debated what to say, and then abandoned any cleverly crafted reassuring words she could have offered. Instead, she walked over to him, stopped a foot away, and then closed the distance between them by hugging him close. She pressed her face to his chest and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist.

"I'm glad you told me, Barry," she finally said.

The tension in him melted away, and he returned her hug.

"Want to do a movie night?" she asked after a while, making no effort to let him go.

A heavy sigh came out of him.

"I really don't want to be here when Joe comes home, Iris…I need time before-"

"Your place then," she said, lifted her head so she could look at him.

He smiled wryly.

"It's a mess, Iris."

She shook her head and smiled. "It's not."

His brows furrowed. "It's not?"

"Nine months ago, it was." She stepped away and patted his chest. "Now it's not."

He was still confused, but he didn't ask how she knew. He got the explanation when they walked in the door and the place was spotless, with even a few pieces of furniture replaced.

"Did…" He turned to face her. "Did you do this?"

She shrugged. "I had to do something while you were gone." She swallowed hard, ordering her tears not to fall. "I was here most days, anyway."

The heartbreaking look on his face when two tears managed to escape made her wipe at her cheeks furiously.

"Don't, Bear. You're here now. That's all that matters."

He forced a smile, then nodded.

"I'll order a pizza. You pick out a movie."

He did as he was told. They spent the night forgetting the day, snuggling on the couch watching movie after movie, and ordering a few more pizzas. She didn't question why he was so hungry and how he could eat so much. Maybe it was because he hadn't eaten for nine months, maybe it was tied to his new powers, or maybe he just wanted to forget. Regardless, he didn't seem aware of the strangeness of it. By the time midnight came, he appeared to have filled his stomach and was contentedly close to falling asleep.

She watched him from where she sat beside him, her legs tucked beneath her, her knees brushing his thighs, her hands in her lap mere inches away from his elbow. She'd missed him so much. She missed his smile and his laugh and his height and his humor and his heart. She'd missed all of him. She wanted to hold him close and never let go. She wanted to stay there forever, because the past nine months had been a living nightmare she never wanted to experience again.

She wouldn't stop him if he wanted to run into danger now to help people. She would simply help him do that. She would be by his side, whether anyone else was or not.

She leaned her head on the couch, watching as he slipped away, and suddenly knew it wasn't his coma affecting her now. Because for months she'd agonized over his absence in her life, over the possibility that he might never wake up. When she was awake she convinced herself that was impossible, but at night the 'what if' haunted her. In the quiet moments when she was working at Jitters and it was slow, she'd slip into that place too. One of those times, her co-worker, Stacy, had taken notice of it.

"Barry?" she'd offered up knowingly.

Iris had blinked and looked at her, surprised and then confused.

"How many days has it been?" she asked gently.

Iris sighed. "Fourteen." She scowled then. "Is that pathetic that I miss him this much? It's been two weeks. People can stay in a coma for months, years. Families in pain for much longer than I've been, and yet here I am—"

"He's your best friend, Iris," she said, squeezing her arm gently. "It's okay to be sad."

She nodded. "Yeah."

A few seconds passed, then Stacy cleared her throat and added, "Maybe he's more than that."

It had taken a while for Iris to digest what she was suggesting, but by the time she thought to question Stacy, a customer had arrived, and it had gotten busy. Once they were freed up enough to talk, Iris was too scared to remind her what she'd said. It had never been brought up again.

But it had stayed with her. It made her start to wonder. For years, for as long as she could remember really, her dad and Barry had been her constants. She'd dated, she'd had flings, but it had never been serious. She'd never needed a serious boyfriend, because she got all her non-familial fulfillment in Barry. And yet he was family in a way. He was the total package. She just never stopped to think that maybe he was everything she needed in other ways too.

She was able to bury the thought, because what bad timing was it to discover she maybe had romantic feelings for Barry when he was in a coma? What if she didn't just have a secret crush? What if she was in love with him? What if she was in lust with him? What if he didn't feel the same way? What if he could never tell her he loved her back in that way? What if they never had sex?

That last one seemed to horrify her more than the others, mostly because the question had floated so easily into her mind when she hadn't even considered it before or really wanted it – or had she?

She thought back to their adolescence, about the times when she'd passed down the hall and Barry's room had been opened a little and she'd thought a lot about the fact that he'd stripped his shirt off to put on another, even if she'd only seen it out of the corner of her eye and never thought twice about it in the moment.

She remembered how jealous she'd gotten when he dated Becky Cooper, and how unbelievably satisfied she'd been when they broke up – especially because Barry wasn't too upset about it.

She remembered the starstruck look in his eyes when she got dolled up for prom and took him as her date, and how he'd barely been able to form sentences for a good half of the night. She'd teased him about it endlessly, but secretly her stomach had been filled with butterflies. She told herself it was the endless compliments he dished out to her, making her feel beautiful when the guy she'd most recently had a crush on took someone else to prom. But she hadn't thought about it.

She hadn't really thought if any of this meant anything except her really loving him as her best friend.

Until Stacy said that; and until Barry walked into Jitters and her heart raced as she jumped into his arms, feeling like she was home again. Like she'd been wandering a cold, desolate wilderness ever since that fateful night, and now she was rescued.

There hadn't been many quiet moments after that one, but right now with him almost asleep, the question beat inside her, the yearning to know – did she have feelings for Barry Allen?

She wanted to know. She had to know. But she didn't want to ruin the amazing friendship they had when she'd just gotten it back if she didn't really feel that way. Especially if he didn't feel the same way. It was possible he did, but it was also possible he was sweet to her because he was a sweet guy in general.

No, she needed to test her theory before she broached the subject with him at all.

She searched her mind for something to prove this possibility – or not. When she landed on it, her heart nearly stopped. Her fingers tingled. She felt hot all over. She suspected that was a good sign, and almost convinced herself that was more than enough proof and she didn't actually have to go through with it.

She licked her lips, debating, then decided she should. She needed to. She wanted to.

She wanted to kiss Barry Allen.

Just to see if there's anything there! She insisted to herself.

But a skeptical mini Iris in her mind rolled her eyes, and muttered a "Sure, Iris."

His breathing had evened out, suggesting he'd fallen asleep. His mouth wasn't hanging open and his face was pressed against the couch toward her. Everything was set up perfectly so she could do what needed to be done then pull away and see if she felt anything.

So, slowly, cautiously, she shifted her positioning slightly, grabbed the back of the couch for support, and leaned in. She gulped, took a breath, then crossed that final distance, pressing her lips to his as he slept.

Instantly chills spread throughout her whole body. She felt as if she'd been lit on fire and was running, screaming through the night, dancing until dawn because wow, she felt incredible. And he hadn't even kissed her back. He'd slept, and she felt that. How would she feel if-

But she lingered too long. By the time she opened her eyes, his eyes were open too. Groggy as he was, she could tell that wasn't the only reason he was looking so confused.

"Iris?" he ventured, his voice raspy.

"I'm gonna go home," she whispered back, her heart pounding. "It's late."

It took her a while to move away from him, but she didn't make it off the couch before he grabbed her wrist, so she couldn't get too far.

"Stay with me," he requested.

She turned back to look at him, thought of all the reasons why now that probably wasn't a good idea.

But she couldn't deny him.

"Okay," she said, allowing him to pull her into him so they could sleep together on the couch.

It took her a while to relax – and not just because his bed would've been far more comfortable than his couch. She was so aware of him now, aware of his body, of parts of it she wanted to touch, and things she wanted to say. And he was aware of none of it. It nearly drove her out of her mind.

Morning came though, and she had managed a few hours of sleep. She'd also decided that everything she realized she felt and the things she wanted to say to him should probably be forgotten. Her needing him in her life was far different from her testing out to see if they worked romantically. She needed him in her life. She didn't need him as a romantic partner.

So, when he asked, confused and a little embarrassed as he did so, "Did we…kiss last night?" she believably chuckled – congratulating herself for that one.

"No," she informed him, shaking her head so she wouldn't have to look him in the eye at first. "What made you think that?"

He shrugged, too embarrassed to make eye contact now too.

"Must've been a dream."

"Weird dream," she commented lightly.

"Yeah."

Silence lingered, and she wondered if she should just tell him. But then he was called to a crime scene, and his powers unexpectedly spazzed out, and he called her in a panic because he didn't know what to do. She found a reason to get off work, and then calmed him down. He was able to return to CCPD after that, and she was at his apartment by the time he wandered home.

She managed to cook him her macaroni and cheese specialty – the sole food she actually succeeded at making, and that she knew he absolutely loved. He hadn't touched it, though. He was sinking into himself, testing out his speed as he remained stationary, half-worried he'd go haywire and fly out the window.

"Barry," she said a few times, then tapped the rim of his bowl with the spoon sitting inside.

He shifted his gaze to her suddenly and stopped vibrating his hand.

"What?" he asked, accidentally vibrating his vocal chords instead.

Just barely, she stifled her giggle.

"Why don't you eat something?" She glanced over at the bowl. "My special mac and cheese, for instance?"

He paled, then blushed. "Right. Sorry." He speed-ate it, finishing before she could tell him to slow down. Seconds after he set the bowl back down, his stomach growled lightly.

She laughed when he frowned.

"I think that might have something to do with my speed."

She snatched the bowl up and traveled the short distance to the stove, so she could refill it.

"Maybe you should ask your people at STAR Labs."

She could feel his glare from across the room. It was still there when she set the bowl back down in front of him.

"Maybe not Dr. Wells, but…maybe the other two?"

She picked up the bowl and shoved it at him when he wouldn't so much as move. Finally, he took it, and she sat down beside him.

"There's just so much we don't know about your speed, about what it means for you when it comes to everyday things. You saw what happened today. You screwed up a whole crime scene because you accidentally sped across it and through important evidence."

He withered slightly, so she quickly wrapped her hand around his forearm.

"Which isn't your fault," she assured him. He nodded numbly. "I'm just saying that…you were at STAR Labs for the majority of the time you were in your coma, and because of their treatment you woke up. You don't have to tell them you plan on being a hero. You could go in on the pretense of being studied. Deal with the rest later."

"I'm a terrible liar," he informed her, as if she didn't already know.

She laughed. "I'll help you through it." His expression changed. "Trust me on this." She gripped his shoulder to get his full attention. "It can't possibly be worse than kissing me."

The words tumbled out before she could stop them. It had the exact effect she'd feared it would. They were both absolutely silent, staring at each other, tense but unable to move. Finally, she looked away, released her grip on him and scooted away from him, not leaving the couch but not getting any closer.

She made no attempt to take back what she'd just said, more than anything because she wasn't sure she could speak after that life-changing, relationship-changing moment.

"So, it wasn't a dream," he said. It wasn't a question, but he was looking for an answer.

She could only bring herself to shake her head slightly. His gaze was impenetrable. She felt stuck and hot. She wished she could run out of there and erase time, make it so those words had never slipped passed her lips.

But she couldn't do that.

"Why did you lie to me?" he asked, more confused than angry. Not angry at all even. Maybe she was angry with herself.

"I didn't know how you felt," she finally said, her eyes flitting up to his for a second. "And I didn't want to ruin things between us."

He frowned. "Ruin? How could you ruin…"

"If it was real," she said. "If you…and I…if we tried…and it didn't…" She sighed and looked up at him fully. "Your friendship means more to me than anything. If things got awkward…if we tried to change things and it didn't work and we put up walls between each other, I just…I couldn't…" Tears welled in her eyes. "I couldn't handle that. That's worse than you being in a coma." She quickly wiped away her tears as they tumbled out of her eyes. "Besides," she said casually. "The moment was awkward. It's good you didn't know it was real; intentional, I mean."

He was silent for a long time, and she returned to the shared silence.

"What about now?" he asked quietly.

She looked back up at him, the reality of what he was asking slamming into her.

"It would be awkward now too," she said quickly, pushing for that because it was better to be disappointed now in the short term than devastated in the long term later.

He looked dejected, and she felt bad about that, but… She couldn't risk it.

Right?

Her brain short-circuited again, not granting permission to anything flowing freely from her mouth.

"But…"

A breath. One. Two. Three.

Then he'd crossed the short distance between them, bracing his hand on the arm of the couch behind her, invading her personal space, not hesitating for even a moment before covering his lips over hers.

Firecrackers, sparks, chills ripped through her again.

This was no lingering peck like what she had given him, though. His lips had closed over hers, but they were urging her to kiss him back, to part her lips, to let him in, to let them have this.

It felt like a century before her lips moved of their own accord, opening for him, and slanting across his. Her eyes closed completely as he continued to kiss her, a quiet moan escaping her when he shifted beside her and cupped her face with one hand, sinking his fingers into her hair.

Her hand moved of its own accord, to his waist, his chest, his face. Not once in her whole life had she loved threading her fingers through his hair as much as she did right now.

And when his hand moved down her body to settle on her hip and then squeezed, she broke away, because wow, they were moving fast. A very big part of her wanted to move even faster, but the common sense in her told her they needed to talk.

"Wait-wait-wait." She braced her hand on his chest and felt his pounding heartbeat beneath her palm.

"Too fast?" he rasped.

She locked her eyes on his. "A little."

"S-sorry." He looked away shyly for a bit. "I've just…wanted to do that for…a very long time."

Her eyes widened. "You have?"

He nodded.

"You mean…" She licked her lips. "You like me? Like that, I mean. Like, you really like me. As more than friends."

His laugh that slipped out was full of amusement.

"I've liked you as more than friends since the moment I met you, Iris."

He looked like he wanted to say something more, to add to what he'd just said, but he held back. She wondered if maybe she didn't want to hear what he had almost said, maybe she wasn't ready for it.

"Oh."

He smiled a little, and she melted.

"I…I just realized…yesterday, when you were in a coma…" She paused to take a breath. "I really don't want to ruin what we have, Barry," she said, desperate to get that point across.

"I know," he said, cupping her face again. "I don't either."

"Well then-"

He kissed her again, lingering a little before kissing her quickly once more and pulling back to look into her eyes.

"I want to be with you, Iris."

Her heart skipped a beat.

"Do you want to be with me, too?"

Not thinking, she nodded in response.

"Then be with me," he said.

She sighed softly and smiled, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him towards her – to which he went very willingly.

She kissed him. The single flick of his tongue against hers drove her wild even in her satiated state, sending a zip running down her spine. He tasted incredible.

The after-effect buzz on her lips from the pressure of their kiss thrilled her, making her toes curl but her body immovable.

"Okay," she said, and kissed him again.