Keeping Solid Counsel (by Sexghosts)

Fandom: Supergirl
Author: Sexghosts (Archive of Our Own author, this work is merely copied to get more publicity for them)

Rating: K

Work Text:

After Cat's car with its tinted windows had pulled away, Kara stood in the street for several minutes, blushing as she replayed in her mind what she'd just done, that she'd kissed and been kissed by Cat Grant. It was hard to wrap her head around it, really. What did Cat want from her? Why did she kiss her? Had all of this mentoring just been leading to that? Was she supposed to be scared of getting hurt? It hadn't even occurred to her that she liked women in the first place, though she didn't care so much about that part. But something clicked in her mind, connecting that kiss to all those little moments when she would catch herself at work letting her gaze linger a little long on her boss's shapely legs in a pencil skirt, or the slope of her neck when she leaned back in her chair to sigh at the heavens in exasperation at something. She had supposed it was just admiration of her stylish grace, but, well….

What was she supposed to do with what just happened? She clutched her head between her hands for a moment.

It had been a long time since she'd been kissed. She knew she didn't experience that the way other people did, on account of her senses being sort of walled-off the way she needed them to be so that she could function on a day to day basis. But she'd always enjoyed the intimacy of it and found herself excited by it, and this was no exception. It was no small thing, she thought, to be kissed by a woman like Cat. WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? she wondered again.

It was almost instinct. She found a place to take off from and swooped through the sky, speeding through the glass canyons of National City. She was aware of the air cooling her flushed cheeks and the light-trails of buildings zipping past, but she more or less autopiloted herself to where she needed to be, and let herself in through the living room window.

Alex was sitting in her pajamas on the couch, reading the newspaper. She sat up with a start and moved to pull the discreet little piece she kept in the end table drawer, but then saw her sister gliding in through the raised sash.

"Jesus Christ, Kara, you couldn't call first?"

Kara was still out of breath. "Sorry, it's important." She shut the window behind her, and drew the blind back down.

"Yeah, well… I could have had company!"

Kara laughed. "You never have company!"

"A gentleman caller!" Alex ranted. "I could have had a gentleman caller and you didn't call to say you were coming!"

"You never have those, either! You're married to your job."

Alex sighed, pouted a little and then sat back down. "Yeah, you're right. Still." She looked at Kara's face and could see that she was pretty worked up over something or other. "If you must drop by unannounced, just do the door, not the window, ok?"

Kara sighed. "Fine. Sorry."

Alex looked at her. "So? What's so important?"

Kara was doing that tiny little bouncing up and down thing that she did when she was too excited to contain herself. Her face a glorious display of nervous excitement, she blurted out, "SOMEBODY KISSED ME AND I KISSED THEM BACK!"

Alex leaned back, clearly a little surprised. "Was it James?"

Kara shook her head. She'd actually completely forgotten about him till Alex mentioned him.

Alex chuckled. "OK, well … are you happy about it?"

"Yes!" Kara exclaimed immediately. Her heart was racing again. Or maybe still. "Maybe." She twirled herself in a frustrated little circle. "Aaaargh, I don't know!"

"Well, who is he?"

"Uh, he's a she?" Kara ventured with a little giggle. Alex's eyebrow raised a bit, but that was the end of the reaction on that.

"OK, who is she?"

"Ummm…." Kara covered her face with her hands and mumbled through her fingers, "It was Cat Grant."

She listened to the stunned silence in her sister's apartment while Alex processed this. She still had her face covered with her hands. The refrigerator in the kitchen was humming loudly. Alex's kitchen sink had a slow drip, and it was banging in Kara's ears, so she took a deep breath and filtered everything out, then opened her eyes again.

Alex was looking at her in disbelief. "I'm sorry, did you just say … you kissed Cat Grant?"

Kara nodded violently, covering her mouth with her hand.

Alex sighed. "Alright, Kara. Sit down. We need to talk about this."

"She kissed me first!" Kara protested as she lowered herself into the sofa. She wasn't sure how it made a difference.

Alex got up and walked to the kitchen, and put on a kettle for some tea. Kara sat fidgeting on the sofa while Alex put everything together; placed the loose tea leaves into the little metal infuser, closed it up, poured a little cream into a creamer, pulled the sugar bowl out of the cabinet. There was something vaguely calming about watching her do this ritual. Alex had spent some time in London for the DEO and had picked up a seriousness about tea as a result. The water boiled, Alex lowered the infuser into the little ceramic teapot, poured the water in, and closed it. She then brought the entire affair over to the couch on a tray.

"So," Alex began, putting on her Big Sister voice, pouring a cup for Kara and handing it to her. "Your boss kissed you. There are all kinds of potential issues with this."

Kara sighed, momentarily miserable, and poured some cream into her tea. "I know."

"I don't need to tell you, it can be risky to get involved with your boss, in any circumstances."

"I know."

"And especially when your boss is someone as powerful as Cat Grant."

"I know," Kara wailed. "But it was really nice!"

"And… not for anything, Kara, but she's really hard on you. Even in the most optimistic of circumstances, a power dynamic like that worries me a little."

"I know all that!" Kara exclaimed, frustrated.

"Drink some tea and calm down," Alex ordered.

Kara drank some tea, but didn't calm down. Well, maybe she calmed down a little.

"So what am I supposed to do?" she demanded after dutifully sipping at her tea for a moment.

Alex sighed. "Well, did you want her to?"

Kara hesitated. It hadn't occurred to her until just that moment, but standing there in the moonlight, drinking wine, the vista of the city spread out beneath them, the peculiar look that Cat had been giving her, she'd surprised herself by rather wishing she would. She was even more surprised when she did. "I … Not until just that moment, but… but, yeah." She admitted. "I don't know, it was just … we were up in the observation deck of Catco Plaza, and it was so fancy, and we were drinking wine, and the city looked so pretty from the balcony… and it just felt romantic…" She realized how stupid that sounded.

Alex sighed.

"So, you were standing out there, and drinking a little… was she drunk?"

"No! We were on our first and only glass!"

"OK, OK. I just have to ask. And then she kissed you."

"Yeah. It was really short…. it was over before I knew what was happening and I was so… I wanted it it to be longer!"

"It was nice?"

"She has REALLY soft lips, Alex! And she smells nice!" Kara was pinballing between giddiness and distress.

"So, yes?"

"YES!" Kara drank down the rest of the hot tea in one shot. Alex winced at that, but didn't say anything.

"So then what happened?"

"Oh, god," Kara moaned unhappily. "Then I stood there like an idiot because I didn't know what to say but I wanted to kiss her again but I was so surprised I thought maybe I had dreamed it and… and then she gave me this lecture about being assertive and going after what I want and…"

"And?"

"And I kissed her again. I put my hands on her shoulders and I kissed her again." She looked at Alex. "It was longer that time, and it was…" Kara sighed, flopped halfway off of the sofa, and looked desperately at Alex. "And then she said something crappy and I got offended and that was it. She put her wine down and said, ok, time to go, and... I blew it, didn't I?"

"Maybe that's not bad," Alex reassured her. "Maybe getting involved with her is a really terrible idea, you know?"

"I knoooooow," Kara sighed. "But … damnit, Alex, I can handle her! I know I can! I wouldn't be in over my head! And why'd she kiss me if she didn't think that about me? I don't know what to do! I don't know what she wants from me!"

"Do you kiss our mom with that mouth?" Alex joked. Kara rarely swore at all, and even a little damnit was a surprise.

"Shut up, Alex! What do I do? Should I call her? Text her?"

"No! Absolutely not! Nope. Nein. Nyet. Non. Uh-huh. Hell no."

"But she gave me this whole speech about going after what I want and–"

"Yes," Alex sighed, "but that doesn't mean being clingy or over-eager. She's your boss, Kara. And for the love of God, Kara, don't be giving her googly eyes at work on Monday. You have GOT to just act like nothing happened. If there's something there, it'll happen in the timing and in the way that it needs to happen."

Kara sat there, deflated. Her head was still buzzing with the all-too-brief sensation of Cat Grant's lips on hers, and her stomach felt like it was full of drunken butterflies that had gotten rowdy on this particular Friday and were showing off for each other by doing flying stunts in her gut. She had no idea what to expect. But Alex was right, she told herself firmly. She had to just brush it off and move on. Even though she had a fifty fifty chance that Cat was going to be wearing one of those skirts that showed her legs. Even though she was probably going to dream all weekend about Cat gripping her by the waist. The night, the balcony, the wine, it had all been romantic; maybe they'd both just gotten caught up in a moment, in the atmosphere of it. That had happened to her at her senior prom, she reflected; she'd gone with a male friend, they hadn't been interested in each other before, but they wound up kissing in the moonlight on the deck of this riverboat cruise afterwards, and it had never gone any further than that. It was just a moment. Maybe this was a moment that would stay up in the observation deck at the top of Catco Plaza.

Her phone made the dinging sound of a text alert. She took it out of her purse and saw she had a text from Cat. "Alex!" she whispered, nervous. "It's her!"

"Don't even open it till tomorrow morning," Alex advised.

"But what if it's important? What if it's a work thing?"

Alex sighed.

Kara opened the text. Two words. Two words that would not seem to hold much meaning, but that Cat had never sent her in the entire time that she'd worked for her.

"Goodnight, Kara."