Alex lay in bed staring up at the ceiling. Her homework was finished, and she'd sat for a while with Kara and watched some romantic comedy she didn't remember the name of. Not that that was anything new. She hardly ever paid attention to one of Kara's romcoms. She mostly just spent the time enjoying cuddling with Kara. That afternoon though, there had been a moment when they were settling down when Kara seemed to hesitate to curl up against her, and Alex had hated it.

Once Kara had settled against her side, she was even more clingy than usual. She spent the whole moving with a fist twisted in the tail of Alex's shirt, and honestly, Alex wasn't sure Kara had been paying any more attention to the movie than she was. There was the same strange tension between them that had been there on the walk home, and Alex wanted it to go away. She was supposed to be Kara's safe place, and she suddenly didn't feel like she was. She felt like Kara was waiting for her to explode.

Given how she'd reacted after Jeremiah had died, maybe Kara was afraid that Alex would react to this new bit of information about Kara and her past with the same sort of hostility. Alex wanted to tell her that it didn't matter that Kara liked girls, and she'd started to do just that more than once, but she couldn't get the words out, because it did matter. It mattered a lot.

Alex had hated the idea that some day Kara would find some boy and fall in love and get married, but somehow, the idea of it being some girl just made it that much worse. She lay there, imagining Tina, the not so secretly gay head cheerleader, or Jo, the butch girl in the drama club asking Kara out. Just the idea of it made her blood boil.

She thought about the way Kara described marriage on Krypton. Being together, sharing burdens, caring for each other, being a source of strength and comfort. It reminded Alex of the House of El motto. Stronger Together. But it also reminded Alex of what she and Kara already had. The closeness, the affection, the way they always reached for each other first when something was wrong. Kara was her best friend, and she was Kara's, and they were stronger together. There was never any doubt in Alex's mind of that. Kara didn't need to go looking for those things with some girl. She already had them. They already had them. Alex would give Kara anything she needed.

Of course, Kara would probably want a physical relationship, too, and she said she didn't want a Kryptonian style arrangement where she found a lover to meet those needs. She wanted a marriage like Clark's parents had, which sounded more like a human marriage.

Alex turned on her side, so she could look at Kara, who was sitting on her bed, working in her sketchbook. She wondered if it would be better if Kara did want a Kryptonian style marriage. Then she and Kara could stay together. It wasn't like Alex was particularly interested in the physical stuff anyway. She'd never really gotten what the fuss was about when it came to boys. She'd chased a few, because that's what people expected. She'd kissed a few, and there hadn't ever been any sparks or fireworks or whatever. She'd mostly just wanted it to be over, and for the boy to quit touching her.

She thought about it. What it would be like. Her and Kara getting an apartment together in National City. She'd go into the lab every day and come home to find Kara there. They'd curl up on the couch and talk about their day. They'd laugh, and cuddle. They'd go on vacations together. Go to work functions on each other's arm.

The idea made her warm and happy, until she thought of the rest of it. Thought of the nights Kara would spend with someone else. Some girlfriend who would touch her and kiss her and… Alex had to stop, because the thought made her feel like she was going to throw up.

"Are you okay?" Kara asked as Alex rolled onto her back.

"Yeah," Alex said.

"You sure? You seem upset."

"Just wondering if I need to introduce Grant's face to my fist to get him to leave you alone."

"Please don't."

"I thought you didn't like him."

"I don't, but you always get grumpy when Eliza grounds you, and if you punch him, you know she'll ground you."

"She'd have to find out about it."

"She always finds out about it, and she said next time, she'd ground you for a month. Although… If you do hit him, I wouldn't have to sit through the new Saw movie in theaters, so maybe I should let you."

"You'd really sell me down the river, just to get out of a horror movie?"

"Yes," Kara said.

"I see how it is," Alex said. "See if I share my pancakes tomorrow."

Kara gave her the puppy dog eyes, and Alex laughed, as if there was ever any chance she wouldn't share with Kara.

She settled back on her pillow and looked up at the ceiling.

She didn't know why it mattered so much, why she was so… possessive of Kara. Why did it matter to her so much if Kara did those things with other girls. Just because Alex didn't enjoy that sort of thing didn't mean Kara shouldn't have it. It didn't make any sense why she got so jealous at the idea. It wasn't like she wanted to be the one kissing Kara.

As soon as she had the that thought, the image of her doing just that popped into her head. Pulling Kara close, leaning in, coving Kara's lips with her own. She had no idea where the image came from, or why she reacted to it the way she did, but her breath hitched and her heart slammed inside her chest and she felt her stomach twist.

"Alex?" Kara asked.

She turned and looked at Kara, who had a concerned expression on her face.

"It's nothing," Alex said as she sat up, forcing the image out of her head. She couldn't bring herself to look at Kara. She was to afraid that if she did, she'd see herself kissing Kara again. She needed a moment to get her head clear.

"I'll be back in a bit." She didn't bother to put on her shoes. She just stood up, headed down the hall and out onto the balcony. She leaned against the rail, looked out at the waves rolling in, and tried to figure out what just happened.

The image of her kissing Kara came back unbidden, but in more detail this time. Before she's just imagined herself kissing Kara. No detail, no setting, just her and Kara kissing. This time, the image was more detailed. She imagined them in bed together, Kara pressed up against her side, Kara climbing on top of her and leaning down. She closed her eyes, because she could almost feel Kara's lips on hers. The kiss wasn't anything like the way boys kissed her, rough and demanding. It was soft, so unbelievably soft.

Alex shook her head, trying to banish the image. What the hell was wrong with her? Thinking of Kara like that. Bad enough she was jealous of anyone Kara even so much as looked at. Now she was fantasizing about…

She closed her eyes, trying to hide from her own thoughts. Why did she have to be like this? Why did she have to be so… possessive of Kara? Maybe it was because she'd lost so much. Her dad, her friends, even in a way, her mother. Eliza was still there, but she was so different now than she was before Kara arrived and before Jeremiah died.

In a lot of ways, Kara was all she had left, but she was supposed to protect her. Not… Want that.

She jumped slightly when she felt someone touch the small of her back, and turned to find Kara looking at her with concern in her eyes.

"Alex?"

"I'm fine," Alex said.

"You're crying," Kara said.

Alex reached up and touched her face, surprised when her fingers came away wet.

"What's wrong?" Kara asked.

"I…" Alex stopped, because she couldn't tell Kara the truth, and she couldn't lie, because Kara would know. She just shook her head. That seemed to be enough for Kara, who stepped forward, and wrapped her arms around her. Alex hugged Kara back, as tightly as she could.

They stayed that way for a long time.

Kara slipped into bed next to Alex, and as soon as she was under the covers, Alex wrapped her up in a tight hug. Kara wrapped her arms around Alex, and held her as Alex resting her head on Kara's shoulder. She reached up, and stroked Alex's hair until she heard Alex's breathing even out, and her heartbeat slow down. Once she was sure Alex was asleep, she turned and pressed a kiss to her forehead.

She didn't know what was hurting Alex. She's wanted to push until Alex told her, but it felt to hypocritical, given that she'd refused to answer Alex's question that afternoon. Instead, she's settled for comforting her as best she could until Alex had cried herself out, then carrying her to bed. She's been afraid that Alex wouldn't want her to sleep in the same bed now that she knew about her sexuality, but Alex had actually asked her to stay.

Kara couldn't put words to the relief she felt that she would get this one more time. This is where she wanted to be every night, in bed with Alex, holding her or being held, feeling the warm of Alex pressed against her. She knew, once Alex knew the truth about why Kara had never told her she liked girls, and why Kara kept the contents of the sketchbooks private, that Alex would probably never be willing to share a bed with her again.

She sometimes wondered if she was wrong for taking advantage of Alex's ignorance of her desires this way. After all, Alex could hardly give informed consent when she didn't know the truth. It was something she tried not to think about. She knew her mother would be horrified at her behavior, but she couldn't bring herself to give up the one or two nights a week that she got to spend with Alex like this. Not when she knew it was the closest she would ever come to the relationship with Alex she really wanted.

Alex shifted in her sleep, snuggling in closer, burying her face in Kara's neck and throwing a leg over Kara, and Kara closed her eyes, repeating the calming mantra she'd used back when she was still learning to control her powers. It helped settle the way her body responded to Alex's movement.

When the aching need had settled back down to the faint buzz of want that was always there when she was with Alex, she whispered a small prayer to Rao, one she's repeated a thousand times before, asking him to fulfill the promise Clark had made, however accidently. It wasn't a prayer she expected to be answered. Truth told, she sometimes wondered if Rao had forsaken her because if her failure to pass on their Kryptonian heritage to Clark.

She pressed another kiss to Alex's head, and whispered, "/.:zhao w rraop/" The Kryptonian words translated to, 'I love you' in English, but English was a clumsy and imprecise language. Love could mean so many things, and I love you were words you could speak to a friend, a parent, a sibling. What Kara had said was precise. I love you romantically. I love you passionately. I love you with all of my heart. I wish to be joined with you forever in the light of Rao. The words she'd spoken meant all of that, and more.

They were rarely used on Krypton. In her entire life, she'd never heard them spoken by one person to another. She'd only read them in books that her mother would shake her head disapprovingly at if she knew Kara had read them. Sagas of adventure and love and romance, written in a time before Krypton had dismissed such things as fanciful wastes of time.

Much as she loved human movies and tv shows and books, when she thought of Alex, she always imagined herself a hero on the old Sagas. A Knight of Argo during the Clone War, or a Champion of Kandor during the Unification. She imagined fighting her way across the battlefields of Wegthor to reach a separatist camp or breaking into a Black Zero compound in the Ghost city of Jerat, to rescue Alex. The daydreams always ended with Alex kissing her, or sometimes with bonding ceremony. The dreams she had about Alex at night had begun going further, lately, with images of hands wandering away from faces and necks, finding places that make Kara ache and want in ways that were new and exciting and frightening all at once.

Somehow, as thrilling and tantalizing as all of that was, it never really compared to the reality of having Alex in her arms. The closer she got to Alex, the closer she wanted to get, and the more it was going to hurt when Alex found out the truth, and Kara lost her, but she couldn't stop. Couldn't bring herself to seek the distance that might save her when she answered Alex's question.

"/.:zhao w rraop/" she whispered one more time before she closed her eyes and let the steady rhythm of Alex's heartbeat lull her to sleep.