Time

Iris's brain is on fire.

Her love for Eddie is peaceful, a calm oasis. Her love for Barry is as wild as the tempestuous sky above Central City that threatens to eradicate all she holds dear.

He is not her brother. She realizes now that what she thought of as care for a sibling was actually something very different—the early, innocent beginnings of the love that binds two people together for a lifetime. Their lips meet. It's not like something unexpected. It's like something inevitable, the end result of a magnetic force as strong as any of Barry's much-loved natural laws.

It all makes sense now. She has often wondered how she can feel as at home in Barry's arms as she feels in her father's, why she has never been able to reconcile herself to the idea of him with a girlfriend. None of the other girls were good enough. No, that's not right any more. The truth is, the real problem is that none of them were her.

She would love nothing more than to stay in his arms, listening to the thump of his heartbeat and knowing that it's beating for her. But there's a flash of red, and suddenly, she sees. There's a reason he always looks familiar, the man in the suit and the mask. There's a reason he's so gentle with her, even when he won't talk to anyone else.

She knows now why he winked.

"You'd better fix this, Allen," she thinks. She wants a nice, long chance to tell him exactly what she thinks about how long he's been lying to her. Love isn't just kissing. Sometimes it's giving someone a piece of your mind.

Over the past fourteen years, Iris has given Barry a piece of her mind approximately four hundred and forty-three times; however, she's never before snuggled in his arms while she was doing it. That part sounds like heaven.


Barry is holding the woman he loves.

Oh, sure, he's hugged Iris lots of times—hundreds of times. The Wests wouldn't let him out of hugs from the first day he'd walked into their house. And he's glad.

But this is different. There's no more pretense of being brother and sister, no more aching heartbreak of loving where he isn't loved back. This is about how well Iris fits into his arms, how safe he feels with her lips on his, the strength coursing through him and into her and back again, like electricity flowing through metal.

The story of his past fourteen years is a story of running, of trying to find his way back home. He knows now what home feels like, what it smells like, how it tastes on his mouth. Home is not a place; home is a person.

She will be angry; he knows that, as he experiences the nanoseconds just before she will see who he truly is. It won't be the first time. He knows all too well what it feels like to incur her white-hot wrath.

But love isn't just kissing. Sometimes it's knowing someone is mad at you and feeling safe anyway. Maybe, sometimes, that part is even more important.


Joe is pretty sure he's going to die. He's faced death before, but he's never been quite so certain he wasn't going to make it out. There's only one Barry Allen; he'd rather see his kid save the city than save him.

Strangely, as he feels himself weaken, it's not Iris who worries him. He loves her, more than he's ever been able to say, but he knows, deep down, that she will be all right. He's been overprotective at times, but his daughter has always been strong, and she will survive.

"Baby, take care of Barry." That's why he wishes he had ESP. He would tell Iris how much he loves her, and then he would tell her to keep Allen close, to protect his fragile heart the way she's been doing for fourteen years, to remember how much he needs her.

"Love you, Bear." That would be his last message, if he had ESP. He would impress on that stubborn, sweet kid's mind that he's not alone and never has been. He would leave Central City with a hero who isn't broken any more.

But Joe West doesn't have ESP, and Iris needs time to figure out what she can't see. And he needs more time to heal the broken light they call the Flash. "I have to live," he breathes, just before he falls unconscious.