i should probably have warned you that there's no set schedule for it. i'll update when i have time to write the words, or when i feel inspired. it could take months to complete. could even take two years.

now, read, ponder, and enjoy!

Yellow. Bright. Lively.

Those were words that could be used to describe National City, as opposed to Metropolis, which was a little grey, still lively, but maybe somewhat too busy. Apart from New York, Metropolis was easily one of the busiest cities in the country. Growing up in it meant getting used to it, but it didn't mean liking it. Metropolis was just too close to Gotham for it to ever be peaceful.

Lena had grown up indifferent to Metropolis; she supposed everyone grew up numb to the place they were born in, unless it was a really nice place or a really bad place. She was born there, studied there, earned her MCAT there, got double-board certified there, and became a renown neurosurgeon with a trauma certificate under her belt.

By all logic, she should have loved it for giving her everything she needed to build her career, but it was nonetheless stale and grey. Then again, if anyone asked her why she'd chosen to move to National City, she still wouldn't know the answer.

One day, she'd picked up a call from the Chief of Surgery at National City General, listening to a job offer that was kind of similar to the one she had at Metropolitan General, and hardly hesitated before she accepted it. She didn't even take a couple of days to consider her prospects; she just confirmed her willingness and signed the letter of appointment once it was emailed to her.

And now she was here, and she still wasn't sure how she felt about it, all the more complicated now that she'd met her ex-wife only one week into her having officially moved her.

"I hate you."

Lena calmly drank her coffee, situated in a calm corner of the café near her new place, which was coincidentally only a block away from Sam's.

"I'm in the doghouse now because of you," Sam tagged on, collapsing on the chair in front of Lena and snatching her coffee away. "Go make it up to me by buying another coffee for yourself. This is mine now," she grumbled, determinedly drinking from the cup and glaring at Lena over the lid.

Lena sighed and remained where she was. She'd just gotten off a 36-hour shift; she didn't need the coffee anyway. "This city is weird."

"Yeah, because it has your ex-wife and ex-sister-in-law in it. Go away," Sam retorted, rolling her eyes and placing the coffee down, though she had a hand wrapped around it protectively. "I slept in the guest room last night. All because of you. I hope you're happy."

"I can't believe that human beings are capable of smiling so much. Even when they're dying in the hospital, they're still smiling. What's in the water?"

"Alex is still not talking to me. Kara is still smashing things around at the station, also not talking to me."

Clenching her jaw at the mention of Kara's name, she opted to look out the window, where there was a mother-daughter pair strolling down the sidewalk, the child holding a balloon and bouncing happily while the mother smiling in indulgence. "Last night, I went to the coffee cart downstairs. It was like 10pm or something, but the guy's still smiling and doesn't seem to care that he's being kept awake because doctors don't stop working. That was weird as hell."

Sam slapped the table between them, so loud that it attracted the attention of their neighbors. Lena turned back to find her best friend glaring at her. "Are you listening to me?" Sam hissed through gritted teeth. "I get it. The city's weird. We'll talk about it when my wife's done banishing me and my sister-in-law isn't trying to kill me with her eyes."

Heaving a deep pocket of air, Lena shook her head and combed her fingers through her hair. "Alex is gonna forgive you in the next couple of days. The woman couldn't bear to be apart from you even if she tried," she dismissed easily, having witnessed the progression of Sam and Alex's relationship over the years. "As for Kara, well, she's a forgiving person. It'll blow over. For you, anyway."

The captain of Station 15 stared at her, studied her, with narrowed eyes and all. Lena didn't relent, keeping their contact as she tapped her fingers on the tabletop. There really was no point in relenting or arguing further. They could all glare at her or throw viper venom at her.

She didn't grow up among the Luthor household without developing some thick skin. She could take it. Besides, the contract had been signed, and she wasn't willing to part with the penalty money in lieu of staying, not after she had decided not to dip into the trust fund her father had set up for her. She was here to stay, even though she had no clue why.

Amidst the hustle and bustle of the morning rush in this café, a girl suddenly laughed, joined by a boy. They were holding hands and probably preparing to go to college, happy as lark.

Lena shook her head and pinched her lips. "This city is weird."

The truth was she knew that Kara was in National City. She knew that Kara was a firefighter in the same station as Sam. She knew that NC General regularly accepted patients from Station 15, because they operated within the same vicinity. She knew that they would meet eventually.

She just didn't know it would be this soon. After all, her employment had only begun a few days ago, and she'd mainly been in the neurosurgery wing to take over things from the former of Head of Neurosurgery. Hell, she hadn't even actually met Alex yet, even though they worked in the same hospital.

It surprised her just as much to encounter Kara on the roadside, doing her life's work as a firefighter. The very work that had become the tipping point of the end of their marriage.

Seeing Kara again had been – well, Lena couldn't even really put it into words. The glasses, the striking blue eyes, and the face that had set off a thousand ships inside Lena's stomach the first time they met. For a second, it brought her back to that very moment, when a young Kara had decided to drape her jacket over a young Lena's shoulder at a frat party.

When they were still married, Lena detested Kara's occupation. The lack of security and the everlasting fear grasping her chest whenever Kara had to be called out. But now that they were here, their names on the dotted lines of divorce papers that they both had copies of, Lena knew for sure that she was proud of her ex-wife, even though Kara would never know it.

God forbid Kara ever knew that Lena was proud of her achievements, making it as a paramedic and a lieutenant. She would never hear the end of it. She didn't ever wanna hear it.

Trauma was thrilling. Neurosurgery was challenging. If anything, they were both the opposite of one another. Trauma required snap decisions within a fraction of a second to preserve a patient's life until the next stop. Neurosurgery compelled calmness and precision to make sure that the surgeon wouldn't accidentally fry the patient's brain and render them dead, or worse, in vegetative state.

By all logical senses, it wouldn't make sense for a doctor to want to do both – one simply wouldn't have the patience for the other. Except…Lena did exactly just that.

She had been in her second year of residency at Metropolitan General, and was still finding it hard to decide which field she wanted to enter. Kara hadn't been around, always getting called away to capture snakes or hose down fires, always risking her life every time she ran into a burning building. The blonde simply didn't have the energy to listen to Lena and her troubles every time she came home.

So after they'd divorced and Kara had skipped down – Lena had heard that from Sam, no less – she sat in a bar with her brother, toasting to the rebeginning of her bachelorette life and pretending that she wasn't still mourning the end of her marriage. Her bald, loving brother, who was himself a genius as a medical geneticist, had somehow given her the best advice she'd ever received in her adult life.

"Just go for both. You're smart as fuck, Lena, smarter than me, even. No one ever said you can only choose one," he had said nonchalantly, draining a shot of vodka and gesturing at the bartender to get him more.

And that was it. And here she was. She didn't know if she made history, but she did know she was more than qualified to be here. However, qualified as she was in neurosurgery and trauma, she certainly wasn't qualified in things like meeting her former sister-in-law after three years of stone-cold silence, despite her best friend being married to said former sister-in-law.

"This cannot be happening," Lena muttered to herself after seeing Alex standing outside the ER, all outfitted in the gear.

Alex turned to her, instructions ready at her lips, only to do a doubletake when she saw who was standing next to her. Lena gulped and looked away from Alex' stormy expression, unwilling to let the look in those eyes deter her from her work. Proper work. The business of saving lives.

An aid car pulled up. When the back doors opened, Lena groaned again. This really could not be happening.

Kara took a pause when she recognized the two doctors standing there, waiting for her. For a moment, the siren went on and on and on, but all three of them just stayed rooted on the spot, kind of in similar states of disbelief. Seriously, it was like the universe was pulling some strings just to make lives harder for all of them.

Fortunately, Kara shook herself out of her daze and jumped out from the aid car, pulling the stretcher from the inside. She started rattling off the stats, mainly focused on Alex, which was fine with Lena, truly. She just wanted to get this over with and pretend that she had met her ex-wife in as many weeks. God, it's a nightmare.

"He tried to cut his ear off," Kara said.

"He what?" Lena exclaimed, noticing a bag that Kara had produced, a bag that contained a sawed-off ear. "We should – we should call psych," she said and gestured for a resident to grab the bag. "Page plastics too."

"We gave him a sedative, but before that, he claimed he was hearing things. Whatever that means."

"Psych. Definitely psych," Alex agreed.

Kara shrugged, because they all had their roles and hers was just to ensure that the patient stayed alive on the way to the hospital. Now, it was Alex and Lena's responsibility to ensure that the patient survived through it all.

Lena got herself situated on one side of the gurney while Alex on the other. As they rolled the patient inside, Lena had to force every muscle in her to keep her eyes on one direction, to not look at the blonde standing behind them at all.

Apart from the guy who tried to cut his ear off, the ER was fairly quiet, save for a few strokes and car crashes. All in all, Lena's first rotation in the ER would have been good, if it wasn't for the encounter earlier.

She sat at the nurses' station, deliberately filtering out Alex's voice and presence, even though she knew full well that the woman was the Head of Trauma, and sooner and later, they would have to talk to each other again. Well, she would face that when it came. For now, she would make herself sit here and cycle through the ER's system to familiarize herself. There was no point in being a trauma surgeon at a hospital if she didn't know how their trauma department worked.

About three quarters into the process, a coffee cup slid into her view. Lena would recognize that wedding ring on that hand anywhere, if only because she'd been dragged to pick it out with Sam four years ago. God, she remembered how she'd chastised Sam for deciding to get married so young; little did she know that a year later, she would be proposed to herself.

"Stop being proud and take the damn coffee," Alex ordered stiffly, jerking the coffee at her.

Lena sighed and reluctantly took it, still refusing to look at Alex. "I hope it's not anything stupid like cappuccino or latte," she commented lowly, stirring the liquid with the stirrer.

Alex sat down on a spare chair next to her and made a disgusted noise. "I'm not disgusting like her," she deadpanned. When Lena finally looked, she realized that Alex had been doing the same thing, not looking – no wonder they used to be close. "You could have told me," Alex blurted out after a long moment of just people watching.

Lena shrugged. "I deleted your number."

"That is harsh," Alex scoffed, shaking her head, an inadvertent smile crawling onto her face. "Seriously?" Lena nodded in affirmation. "Did you block me too?"

The neurosurgeon winced, stirring the coffee a little faster now. At this point, the sugar would evaporate before Lena had even taken a sip, not that science actually worked that way. "Yeah, yeah, I did."

Alex scoffed and shook her head again, completely in a state of disbelief at how straightforward Lena had been and still was. "You're a stone-cold woman, Dr. Lena Luthor."

"Yes, your sister told me that once."

At the mention of Kara – not even her name, for the love of god – they both sobered up. It was as if they were emanating negative energy, just driving away the nurses and emergency medical specialists around them. Well, they would have no choice but approach the trauma surgeons on call today, but otherwise, Lena was fairly appreciative of their attempts to stay away.

She licked her lips and finally drank the dark liquid that had become sustenance in the years since she'd passed her MCAT. An enthusiastic moan escaped her throat once she tasted the bittersweet liquid. Just the way she liked it. Doctors, they were one of a kind and they gotta stick together, as lots of people would say.

"You could have told me," Alex repeated, a somber twist to her lips. "I've been so worried about you."

The reaction was immediate, in which Lena's head snapped up so fast that it was kind of a miracle that she didn't need an ortho to fix it. She stared into the side of Alex's head, burning her gaze into the red hair. Inside, she didn't allow herself to well up at the words, to physically react in a way that would completely destroy her reputation in the hospital before she'd even begun to build one.

She swallowed thickly and cleared her throat loudly. At one point in her life, Alex Danvers had been one of her closest friends. They shared things in common. Hell, she met Kara through Alex, to the latter's utter disgust when she found out that she and Kara had been knocking boots. But then she signed her name the dotted line and walked away, and she didn't allow herself the privilege of keeping the people in her life too.

Divorces didn't work like that.

"I'm not married to Kara anymore," she said, as if Alex didn't already know that.

When she saw the look on Lena's face, Alex smiled sadly. "Come on," she whispered heavily. "You have to know that wasn't the only reason I cared about you."

"But you looked so angry just now. You kicked Sam to the guest room."

Alex nodded and shrugged. "I wasn't angry because you broke my sister's heart." Lena clenched her jaw at that. "I was angry because I spent all these years worrying about you, pretending that my wife wasn't still in touch with you. I was angry because you kicked me to the curb, as if I didn't mean anything after you and Kara fell apart."

The raven-haired woman didn't really have an explanation other than the fact that she was weak and she had been in a state of mind where any reminder of Kara would have been detrimental to her mental state. And Alex, out of all the people they had in common, was the starkest reminder of Kara Danvers.

"Alright," she muttered and fished for her phone. She opened up her contacts and went to the blocked list. "Wait, I forgot your number."

"How many people have you blocked?"

"It's not fun being a Luthor," Lena said, shaking her head. Alex looked at her with a combination of skepticism and disbelief. Lena rolled her eyes and pinched her nose with her free hand. "Believe it or not, I missed you too. Kara and Sam never really know what it's like to be in our shoes."

Alex scoffed and nodded in agreement. "That's true." She snatched Lena's phone and scrolled, cursing every few times because really, Lena had spent half her life blocking unwanted numbers – it really was a Luthor thing. "I'm kind of glad that I'm not born with your last name." Lena hummed. Alex made a victorious noise and tapped the phone a few times. "If you block me again, consider us enemies for life," she said, a little jokingly but also a little seriously.

Lena took her phone back and took a look at the screen, stopping as she read Alex's name. It had been three years since she had that name on her phone. And weird as it was, it felt good nonetheless. In no way was her life returning to before, but this…felt a bit like normalcy.

"You're not stone-cold," Alex announced.

They had both just finished their shifts. It was the crack ass of dawn and they were ready to go home; Alex to her wife, and Lena to her brand new but sparse apartment just a few blocks away. It wasn't embarrassing to change in front of each other; they'd seen one another at their worst, what with having interned at the same hospital before Alex moved away.

Lena made a perfunctory hum, not really listening, more focused on getting the grime out her teeth. One of the worst things about coffee. Alex made sure to make eye contact through the mirror, grave and heavy. Lena slowed down in brushing her teeth, perking her ears up for what would come next.

"I know you said things to each other. Divorced couples always do," the redhead began hesitantly. "I don't really know the details, but what I do know is that you're not stone-cold." She raised her brows, challenging Lena. "You're not."

"I did leave her."

"She left you first."

It was quiet, save for Lena's gargling and spitting it out. She rested her hands on the edges of the sink and almost rested her entire weight of it – it was sturdy enough not to crack under pressure. She watched the water swirl and swirl and swirl. Behind her, Alex was still staring at her.

They were in love. They were happy. And then they were not. Somewhere along their two-year marriage, Lena had grown exhausted and Kara had gotten distant. Somewhere along the lines, Lena figured there was no way she could stay in a marriage where she wasn't looked at anymore.

All this while, she thought no one ever did understand her point of view. Why she'd decided to file the papers and surprise everyone with them. She was just tired. She had always assumed that the blame was laid on her, giving up on their marriage.

Well, at least now she knew that Alex understood. That was a relief, because Kara did leave first.

Lena had never had a thing for the outdoors. The sun was too bright or the streets were too dark. The bugs were too annoying or the silence was too loud. The people were too happy or the passersby were too rude.

The point was that she had always preferred to stay indoors. To lounge on her couch and read the next book on her reading list. Watch the most pointless reality show on TV and pretend as if they were the best entertainment in the world. Make tea.

But after her first foray into the OR, after finally winning the opportunity to have her hands directly fixing the patient and feeling like she was contributing something to a bleak world, Lena had fostered a habit. Upon clocking off, she wouldn't go home. She would instead make her way to the nearest park and just…take a walk. Without any purpose.

Well, with one purpose. The rays of the sun would burn away the traces of blood on her hands, even though she'd washed it all away. The very things she didn't like about the outdoors would remind herself that not everyone was waiting to go to hospital to be operated on. They were still alive and healthy and she wouldn't have their blood on her hands.

Being a doctor wasn't without perks. The pay was good. The thrill was exciting. The Hippocratic Oath kept her on her toes. Sometimes though, a patient would pass away or worsen in their conditions, and she would be reminded that she wasn't a superhero. Lena was just a human being who had the skills to fix others to the best of her ability.

"Oh, hi."

Lena stopped and turned away from the children playing on the playground, though the sun had already set and the only illumination they had was the streetlamps. Kara was standing in front of her, hands stuck in her coat pockets and a dumbstruck expression on her face.

Lena imagined she looked the same.

"Hey," she gasped, blinking rapidly. "Wow, I haven't seen you in civilian clothing in so long."

"Well, it's been three years."

"It's been much longer than that."

It was true. In their last days together, when everything had gone from bad to worse, they'd only seen each other in passing, and Kara had always been in her uniform, albeit in Metropolis system. Hell, Kara hadn't even bothered to take off her uniform when they'd signed the papers, heading back to the station immediately after.

Sheepishly, hands reached up to adjust square-rimmed glasses. A lot of things about Kara had changed – her shape, her mannerisms, the fullness to her face. Those glasses remained the same. Somehow, Lena found comfort in that, as if it would have mattered at this point. Go figure.

"What are you doing here?" Lena asked.

"What? A girl can't even take walks now?" Kara teased.

Lena chuckled and joined Kara's side, starting to walk in the direction where she'd come from. "No, I just – you've never liked taking walks with me."

"But I still did."

"Yeah, but you didn't like it."

"I did."

Lena scoffed, shaking her head. For some reason, a sense of frustration began to rise in her chest. That seemed to be a pattern as well whenever they were in each other's presence. Even when they were saving that guy in the road accident, Lena had been frustrated, especially when Kara had asked for her credentials.

She didn't debate further though. After months and months of arguing with Kara, she knew that they would only both end up walking away and freezing each other out. And tonight, Lena was too tired to even bother. Honestly, she should have just said hi and went about her way. She didn't know why she'd chosen to walk by Kara's side to a direction where her place was definitely not.

"I picked up on it," Kara muttered, playing with her glasses again. "I came to National City and I just – one day, I just found myself coming here and walking after work. And I never stopped."

A heartbeat. "Funny," Lena deadpanned. "You used to show me exactly how much you disliked it whenever I made you do it with me."

"That's not fair. I was tired and I wanted to stay home."

"You were always tired," Lena spat out, letting the frustration get the better of her. They had both stopped in their steps. "That's the thing, Kara. You were always tired. Tired from your job. Tired of having to do chores. Tired of being in that house. Tired of me."

Kara swiveled to face her, her mouth opened, like she had a litany of angry words to throw back in Lena's face. But then something stopped her, maybe something on Lena's face – honestly, Lena didn't know.

She had stopped knowing anything about Kara a long time ago, despite having been one of the few people who knew to read Kara best.

"I did love you," Kara settled, coming out low and weak.

Another heartbeat. Lena hated it. She hated how Kara hadn't been in her life for three whole fucking years and yet, her heart still wanted to beat for her in the most random of moments. She hated that after three fucking years, she still couldn't get herself to completely hate her ex-wife, even though she'd read a lot of books how that was common between divorced couples.

"I know you did. But somewhere along the way, you got tired of even that," Lena whispered back, losing the vitriol from earlier. She sighed and shook her head. "Enjoy your walk, Kara. I'm gonna find another park."

She made herself walk away. Her dignity had been a lost cause in the course of their relationship. But now that she'd picked herself up and got on with her life, she refused to lose it once again front of the same woman who'd taken it away from her in the first place.

my parents are divorced. i know what i'm talking about.