Today is a beautiful day ; not that Kara wants to jinx it or anything, but it is, with a blue sky and perfect cottony clouds that seem almost artificial, and a light breeze that ruffles her hair as she stands in front of her open window to greet the sun. Lena also happened to ask her to come over for breakfast. She feels giddy, like a schoolgirl with a crush and it's a nice change from feeling trampled by the weight of several worlds. It's not going to be easy, and she doesn't want it to be, she wants to work for Lena, but they are rekindling their relationship, and it's a start.

She's changed her outfit thrice before settling on a worn grey t-shirt and a checkered flannel that has been buried far in her closet since her college days ; she didn't even know she still had it but if feels right to be wearing it right now. The fabric is soft, smells like several kind of laundry detergents and it's a bit too big for her, the sleeves drooping down to cover her thumbs. She's taken a pre-breakfast, so she will look at least semi-civilised, and she's got flowers for Lena and a book about deep sea fishes for Taylor. She asked Alex to not call her unless the threat is of a planetary level, and operation perfect morning is a go.

She elects to go there by bus, because flying will most likely ruin the flowers she picked, and she wonders if she can tell that to Lena, if it will make her smile, or if it's too soon for secret identity related inside jokes. She ends up being ten minutes early, despite the slight traffic and it gives her a bit too much time to fret in front of the penthouse after being allowed up by the doorman. She rearranges her hair, rights her glasses, re-rights them when she nervously bumps into them on her way to adjust her shirt around her shoulders, then anxiously goes through a round of Kelly's breathing exercise, gently taught on a late night when she barged into Alex's apartment to spill her guts. Eventually, when she's only one minute early, she raises her fist and knocks on the door.

Her knuckles only connect with the wood once before the door is swung wide open and Kara almost tumbles in with the momentum of going to knock a second time.

"Hi," Lena breathes. "Security cameras," she adds, justifying her eagerness by waving to a monitor embedded next to the door. "I thought you weren't going to come in."

"Hi," Kara echoes stupidly, caught in the shy softness that radiates from Lena. She's wearing an oversized cardigan thrown over a dark heather grey shirt carefully tucked in the waistband of washed out jeans, almost frayed at the knees. Her hair is up in an untidy bun, like it's been tied as an afterthought to reveal the slope of her neck. Kara clears her throat clumsily, trying to find a place for her eyes to settle without it being too much. "I brought you flowers," she says, extending her arms to breach the gap between their bodies.

"Plumerias," Lena smiles. "Thank you." She takes the bouquet from Kara's hand and rubs her fingers on delicate petals. "Yellow ?" she probs, "that's different."

"New beginnings."

"New beginnings," Lena repeats. "I'll go put them in water, make yourself at home."

Kara nods, hesitates for a second before she toes her shoes off and pushes them next to the door. The floor is cold under her feet. "Where's Taylor ?" she asks, following after Lena, and trying to familiarise herself with the new space. The penthouse doesn't quite smell like Lena yet, strong detergent still overpowering the usual scent of white flowers and hot metal.

"On the balcony," Lena says as she arranges the flowers in a vase. "Doing Kryptonian things. I had to buy new candles because mine, and I quote, 'suck.'" She shakes her head, smiles good-naturally to show she doesn't really mind.

Kara glances around, finding Taylor sitting cross legged and shoeless on the balcony with a large candle lit in front of them. "Oh," she whispers, the sight tugging at her heartstrings, "they're praying."

"Do you do that too ?" Lena asks quietly, giving Kara room to answer by busying herself with laying out golden scones on a plate.

Kara sighs, resisting the urge to adjust her glasses. "Not really," she says. "I. I've..."

"You've lost touch ?" Lena offers.

"Yeah."

"Go then if you want. I'm sure they won't mind."

Kara glances at Taylor then back at Lena. "You need help with breakfast," she says, shaking her head dismissively.

"I don't. Everything is ready, you can go. If you want." She stares at Kara in a gentle calculated way and Kara stares back because her heart doesn't give her a choice. Lena seems to ponder over something for a minute and then, with slightly shaky hands she reaches out to pluck Kara's glasses off her face. "Go."

Kara's heart stops ; the world does too, only to resume its course around this single moment, Lena's fingers brushing against her temple, the timid smile on her face. Kara never would have dared hope something like that would ever happen and yet, here they are, her glasses folded in Lena's hands and no secrets between them. It's like taking her first breath all over again.

With each intake of breath, Rao flows through their body, anchoring them to something immutable and kind, and giving them strength and peace to go on. Even with their eyes closed, they can perceive everything around them, the warmth of Earth's sun, the flicker of the candle's flame, the soft whistle of the wind, and below their feet, thousands of pumping hearts. They take everything in with each breath, and release it gently with each exhale. Rao takes their worries and returns them along with the power to deal with them.

They don't really remember when they started doing it, there's a fairly old picture of them sitting cross legged on their Yeyu's lap while she's praying, but at this point it's second nature. There was a moment when it got hard, when the world became to loud and they couldn't just let it flow through them with Rao's help. They got angry, and sad, at being half part of a dead culture ; and then it passed, and Rao became a grounding strength once more, even if they will never feel His true warmth on their skin.

They welcome a new disturbance, a body dropping down a couple of feet away from them ; Kara is here, and it's nice to have her there with them. Except it's supposed to be a well oiled machine, in the future, they do it together all the time ; but this Kara clearly isn't used to it yet and she just can't seem to stop moving. She shuffles, changes position, breathes out loudly, clears her throat, scratches her neck, her nose, her feet, shuffles again, sighs, and Taylor might want to strangle her, just a little.

They exhale longly, trying to push away the frustration of all these little wrongs before they can pile up and swallow them whole. "You have no idea what you're doing, don't you ?" they ask, opening their eyes and turning to find Kara with her face scrunch up and a deep frown between her closed eyelids.

"It's been a while," Kara admits quietly, uncrossing her legs and almost knocking the candle over when she spreads them in front of her. "When I landed here I used to pray a lot, but I was trying to fit in and I was so angry," she says, her voice strained, almost on the verge of being too harsh. "I felt abandoned, so I stopped. I tried again, later, recently even but, but..."

"You've lost faith ?" Taylor offers weakly.

"No," Kara fires immediately, clearly afraid of even just thinking about it. "No," she says again, quieter, "I've just lost touch with it and I don't know how to pick it up again. I want to. But I don't know how."

Taylor mulls over it for no more than a second before they jump to their feet and extend a hand to help Kara up before they can think too much about it. "Come on," they say. "We're trying something different."

Kara stares at their hand for long seconds, long enough for Taylor to reconsider it, to wonder if the truce between them is too fragile for that, before Kara grabs it and accepts the help.

"So..." she trails.

"Sometimes," Taylor begins, starting to slowly walk the length of the balcony, "when I can't stay still, when I'm angry, I just walk and vent to Rao. Like you know 'hey buddy, this sucks and I could use some strength.' It helps, and I think it'd be a good place to start again for you."

Kara snorts and falls in step with them. "You call Rao buddy ?"

"No I don't. It's an example to lighten the mood. Try it."

They stop, let Kara walk past them and observe as she keeps pacing around, a deep thrown etched on her face. She mouths along to what she's thinking and Taylor thinks they catch an amusing "buddy" but mostly they notice the way she walks slower and slower as tears start streaming down her cheeks, the way she almost stumbles before she slumps against the railing, face turned towards the sun in excruciating pain. Taylor wavers, wondering if their plan was a good idea, if they haven't done more harm than good. Behind them, in the apartment, they can hear Lena putting her book down and walking closer to the open window.

Time goes still, then Kara turns her palms up and opens her eyes. "It's a start," she crooks with a sad smile.

Truthfully, this isn't what Lena had in mind when she asked Kara to come over for breakfast ; but it's nice, in an -is this real ?- sort of way. She didn't expect the flowers, but she expected the nervousness ; she expected awkward conversations, she didn't expect to see Kara praying, to be the witness of such a raw and intimate moment. It makes her want to hug her and never let go, to coddle her in blankets and rock her to peace until there isn't even an ounce of pain in her body.

And it makes her want to run, as far as she can and to never look back. It's visceral, the urge to not let Kara in and to not peek behind her own walls ; it tears her apart, the need to hide, to protect herself, and the desire to learn by heart every inch of Kara and to show her all of her soul in return. Battle rages inside of her and it's a fight she wants to win, but doesn't know how to.

Because how does she love Kara so much and gets to be loved in return when there is so much history ?

And how does she get to be loved so fiercely, so unconditionally, when in exchange she brings nothing but pain and flaws ?

Maybe it's a dream, one that staggers just on the edge of being a nightmare, and she doesn't want to wake up, because no matter how confusing it is, no matter how hard she has to swim to keep her head out of the water, it means that somehow, she gets to have Kara, and it's worth it.

She tries not to look at her too much, or at least to make it less obvious, but she can't stop herself, her eyes drifting up from her book every minute or so to find Kara. She reads the same page over and over until both Kryptonians return to the living room.

Kara finds her immediately, not that it's hard really, she's sitting on an armchair right across the balcony ; but she can't help but marvel at Kara's tendency to just know where she is, to find her always, each time she enters a room. It's reassuring, makes Lena feel less alone in her own capability to tune into Kara's presence ; at least, they're in this together.

Sometimes she can't help but wonder how exactly she managed to ignore the tender look on Kara's face for so long, how deeply in denial she must have been to just not see an exact mirror of her own expression on her best friend's face. Because it's here, clear as day, a certain softness that Lena has seen taking over Kara's face time and time again when she lays her eyes on her. Even now, with red eyes and tear tracks on her cheeks, her face lights up when her gaze finds Lena's, and she looks at her like she's hung the stars and moon in this way that is sometimes too much, and sometimes just right. Today, it's just on the verge of being too much.

"How much bacon do you want ?" Lena asks, clearing her throat in an awkward attempt to defuse the moment.

Kara coughs on a wet laugh. "How much do you have ?" she asks back.

Taylor rolls their eyes, pushes past both of them on their way to the kitchen, and the morning rolls on.

With warm creamy coffee in her stomach and several slices of bacon under her belt, Kara regains some energy and tentatively launches herself in a retelling of her most recent phone call with Cat Grant, her former mentor having taken to checking in with her every few weeks. She's in the middle of mimicking Cat's distinctive speech pattern, drawling an amusing "Kieeera," when she stops, stutters and blushes.

It takes Lena a full thirty seconds to realise what's going on, absorbed as she is in her contemplation of a ray of light dancing on Kara's face, and another half minute to realise that her intense staring is the reason Kara stopped talking in the first place. She chokes on nothing, manages, somehow, to stammer even though she isn't talking. Caught in the act, her own cheeks heat up, and she ducks behind her mug of lukewarm tea, the liquid having grown cold while she was busy memorising Kara.

Taylor feels like they are third-wheeling on Kara and Lena's date ; there is no other way to describe this. It's not an entirely unfamiliar situation. Their mothers have been insanely in love since before they can remember and they are used to them making gooey eyes at each other in various settings and situations. Most of the time, they tend to admire their love, its resilience and capacity to grow and flourish, ever strong. Some other times, it's just plain gross. Right now, with the way Kara and Lena are stealing glances over their respective cups and floundering over their words, Taylor feels like they're sharing a meal with two awkward teenagers.

It's not an ideal situation, not one they would have ever thought they'd find themself in ; but it's also strangely heartwarming, to witness the beginning. It's a good reminder of why they're here, of what they are protecting by staying behind to fix the mess they accidentally dragged in their wake. It's not just about them, about protecting their future and their place in it. It's about Kara and Lena, and the ferocious, but tottering, love they share.

Kara shovels a forkful of pancakes in her mouth and Lena snort-laughs when she notices the syrup running down her chin and it's disgusting, truly, but it's also somehow a small divine gift that Taylor intends to enjoy. So of course, this is the moment the day chooses to go awry.

Kara's DEO phone start shrilling and she groans, setting her fork down in favour of dropping her head in her hands.

"This better be of galactic proportions."

The words are barely out of her mouth when the sky quite literally splits open, bright blue lighting bolts shooting from the crack.

"Supergirl," a low voice booms. "The time has come for you to answer for your crimes."

Kara sighs, the suit already materialising over her clothes. "Oh for Rao's sake ! Again ?!"