Lena suppressed her irritation when she slowly rolled up to the curb and there was no sign of Lucy. They had agreed on two o'clock sharp, and it was already five minutes past, thanks to the throngs of students Lena had to drive past at a snail's pace. Lena was on a tight schedule—she jammed a finger on the button for her hazard lights, ignoring the honks and curses from the other vehicles that now had to swing around her.

It was typical Lucy. In hindsight, Lena should have scheduled this whole ordeal at least a half-hour earlier; then there would have been no risk. It took a full eight minutes for Lucy to finally make her way out of her apartment building, tugging Lena's newest road-trip companion by the arm; a tall, muscular blonde woman who carried two heavy-looking duffel bags slung over her shoulder.

"Finally," Lena muttered, glaring at her wristwatch as she rolled her window up. "Morning, lovebirds. You're late."

Lucy giggled. "Sorry, Lena, my watch stopped," she lied rather atrociously, but Lena decided not to call her out on it, in the interest of time.

Lena rolled her eyes. "Whatever," she popped her trunk; it sprung open with a loud click, and Lucy's girlfriend—Lena had forgotten her name—immediately strolled to the back to divest herself of her cargo.

Lucy was smiling genially as she draped herself over Lena's window. "Lena, this is Kara," she nodded towards the blonde rummaging through Lena's trunk, trying to make everything fit. Lena popped her head out of the window, giving a little awkward wave as Kara slammed the trunk shut. "Hi."

"And Kara, this is Lena," Lucy continued. "She'll be your buddy on the trip to National City."

Lena rolled her eyes at the word 'buddy', but Kara stepped closer and wrapped an arm around Lucy's waist from behind. The other she stuck through the open window, offering her hand in greeting.

"Hiya," she said jovially. "Kara Danvers."

"Lena Luthor," Lena greeted, taking the other girl's hand in a cordial shake she immediately regretted once she encountered sweat. She wondered if she'd be able to discreetly wipe her hand somewhere.

"Charmed," Kara quipped, but her attention was already elsewhere as Lucy practically pinned her against Lena's car.

"I'm going to miss you, baby..."

"I'm going to miss you, too..."

"Oh, come on," Lena groaned, wiping her hand on her pants. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel, trying the ignore the couple currently sucking face while plastered against her vehicle. Honestly. She fiddled with her keys in the ignition, giving them a few moments—Lucy's girlfriend was leaving, after all, it had to be an... emotional moment.

"I love you..."

"And I love you too!"

"No, I love you more!"

"No, silly, I love you m-"

"Ahem." Lena cleared her throat, but the two paid her no mind. Indeed, their embrace became more urgent; Lucy had her fingers entwined in Kara's hair, while the blonde's hands seemed to be travelling a downward path to Lucy's bottom. "Ahem."

Ignored for a second time, Lena heaved a sigh and slammed on the horn. The two girls jumped, and Lucy looked at her sheepishly while Lena flashed an apologetic smile that was not entirely sincere.

"Sorry!" she said, opening the door for Kara, who did not look contrite in the least. She took a moment to kiss Lucy once again, and Lena could not help but roll her eyes.

"Do you want to start the first shift?" Lena asked, motioning to the wheel.

Kara waved her off as Lucy embraced her again. "Nah, nah, you're already at the wheel, I'm good," she said before Lucy dove in for another kiss.

"I'm going to miss you so much..." Lucy cooed into their kiss as Kara held onto the open car door for balance. "Call me!"

Kara chuckled, a low rumble in her chest. "I'll call the minute I get there."

Lucy peppered her face with kisses. "Call me from the road."

"I'll call before that."

"Ahem!"

The two stopped abruptly, and turned a half-apologetic look towards Lena. Kara laughed, pecking Lucy's lips one last time before sliding into the passenger seat and slamming the door shut.

"Off we go," Lena said through gritted teeth, pulling out as Lucy strolled alongside the car, fingers hooked onto Kara's for as long as she possibly could with the car at a slow speed.

"Bye, baby! Bye, Lena! Have a safe trip!"

"G'bye, babe!"

"Call me! I love you!"

"I love you too!"

Lena breathed a sigh of relief once she was finally able to pull into the city traffic. Kara had been silently rummaging in through the backpack she had on her lap, rifling through what looked to be cassette tapes, a large assortment of pens, and miscellaneous items of clothing, and Lena observed quietly out of the corner of her eye.

"So..." Lena began, only to be interrupted by a sudden yelp of excitement as Kara pulled out a literal bunch of grapes from some forgotten pocket.

"Aha!" She waved them in the air triumphantly. "Want a grape?" She bit at one, straight from the bunch before she could receive an answer.

Lena raised an eyebrow. "No, thank you." She said, turning her nose.

Kara shrugged. She chewed silently for a few moments, then turned her head and spat the seeds at the window. They collided with the glass with a loud splat that made Lena's lips pull into a terse line.

Kara turned to her with a grin. "I'll roll down the window."

Lena rolled her eyes, shaking off her disgust. "Listen, I've got this trip all figured out. It's an 18-hour trip to National City, which breaks down to six shifts of three hours each. Alternatively, we could break it down by mileage." She pointed at the visor on Kara's side; the blonde was only barely paying attention. "There's a map here, I've marked the locations where we can change shifts. Can you do three hours?"

"Sure can," Kara nodded. "Grape?"

Lena shook her head. "I don't like to eat between meals."

"Okey-dokey."

There was a long, nearly interminable silence as they wound through the city streets and onto the highway, only interrupted by Kara's occasional spitting that Lena tried her very best to ignore. At least the blonde had wiped at the mess on her window before rolling it down, even if she did do it with her shirt sleeve.

They had been silent for so long Kara startled her when she started speaking again.

"I hope this isn't one of those trips with long, awkward silences."

Lena nodded absent-mindedly. "Me, too."

There was a long, awkward silence. Kara shifted in her seat.

"So, tell me the story of your life."

Lena had to laugh. "The story of my life?"

Kara shrugged. "Yeah, why not? We've got eighteen whole hours to kill before we get to National City. Might as well fill the silence."

"My life won't even fill one of those hours. I mean, nothing's really happened to me yet. That's why I'm going to National City."

"So something can happen to you?"

"Yes."

Kara munched on a grape, pensively. "Like what?"

"Like going to school to get my PhD, then become a materials engineer and work in a lab doing cutting-edge research."

"So you can tinker with materials while locked away in a lab so your research benefits other people?"

Lena frowned. "That's one way to look at it."

"OK. Suppose nothing happens to you. Suppose you live your whole life in the hustle-and-bustle of National City, but you're in a lab the whole time so you don't really see it, so nothing happens and you never meet anyone and never go anywhere and you never become anything, then finally you die one of those big-city deaths where no one even notices you're dead until two weeks later and your neighbors just can't take the smell anymore?"

"Jesus," Lena hissed, quickly looking over at the other girl. It was a weirdly morbid thought for someone who seemed to be of such a sunny disposition in their limited interaction. Who the fuck am I stuck in this car with? "Lucy failed to mention this dark side of yours."

Kara laughed; Lena could see half-chewed grapes still in her mouth. "Yeah, that's what drew her to me."

Lena was unconvinced. "Your dark side?"

"Yup," Kara said, smacking her lips with the word. "Why? Don't you have a dark side? Are you one of those insanely cheerful people? Do you always see the glass as half-full; wait, wait, don't tell me: do you dot your i's with little hearts?"

Lena barked out a laugh. "Absolutely not. I have as much of a dark side as the next person."

Kara grinned, looking strangely pleased with herself. "Really? How's this for dark—when I get a new book, I always read the last page first. That way, if I die before I finish it, I know how it ends. That, sweetheart, is a dark side."

The brunette rolled her eyes, getting irritated. "That doesn't make you deep." She shook her head. "I'm generally a pretty happy person, I would say."

"So am I."

"Great."

"Great." Kara said through her grin, back to munching on her grapes. "Do you ever think about death?"

Lena focused on the road. "What kind of question is that? Yeah, I suppose."

Kara spat another cluster of seeds out the window. "Uh-huh. I bet. Pretty girl like you, thinking about death. Probably a fleeting thought, that drifts in and out of your mind. I spend hours, no, I spend days..."

"What, do you think that makes you a better person somehow?" Lena interrupted, annoyed.

"Look, when shit goes down, I'm going to be prepared. You're not. That's all I'm saying."

Lena snorted. "And until shit does go down, you're just going to ruin your life waiting for it to happen. Congratulations."

There was a pause that stretched into another long silence. Lena couldn't decide if this one was awkward or not.

"What are you going to do in National City?" she asked before the silence could turn awkward.

Kara shrugged, too busy chewing her grapes and spitting her seeds to answer right away. She heaved a sigh. "I don't know. I just got my Communications degree, but I have no idea what I'm going to do with it. I see it as a jumping-off point."

Lena chuckled. "You could be a journalist. The kind that writes obits. Something tells me you'd get a kick out of it."

She had said it with half jest, half bite, but Kara laughed uproariously, smacking a hand on her thigh and nearly squashing the remaining grapes as she did so.

They switched places at the designated point along the beautiful stretch of highway, with Lena calling time while Kara dozed off for a few minutes. Conversation didn't exactly flow, so Lena had allowed Kara to play one of her cassettes—some music that she didn't recognize, but that Kara hummed along to contently. It was more than enough to fill the silence.

Eventually—Lena can't even remember who started the subject—they began to talk about movies; Casablanca specifically.

"He doesn't want her to stay, come on," Kara argued as she steered. "That's why he puts her on the plane."

Lena shook her head vehemently. "You're missing the point. I don't think she wants to stay."

"Are you kidding me? Of course she wants to stay. Wouldn't you rather be with Humphrey Bogart than... whoever the other guy is?"

Kara's stomach growled, and Lena had to hold back a grin of satisfaction. Just in time—she had already pre-planned a stop at a rest-stop, and it was already coming up ahead.

"I wouldn't want to spend the rest of my life in Casablanca married to some guy who runs a bar. You probably think that's snobbish of me, but I merely think it's practical."

Kara looked practically bewildered as she turned into the exit for the motel and restaurant. "So you'd rather have a passionless marriage..."

"And be First Lady of Czechoslovakia," Lena interjected.

"...than live with the man you just had the greatest sex of your life with, just because all he does is run a bar in Casablanca?"

She parked a little aggressively in front of the diner, and Lena gave her a look. "Of course, and so would any other woman in her right mind. You've got to be practical; I'm sure Ingrid Bergman is, which is why she gets on the plane at the end of the movie. Case closed."

They left the car; Kara was still shaking her head. "I understand," she said sarcastically.

"What?"

"Eh, nothing."

Lena followed her indignantly as Kara made her way across the diner, settling in a booth. The brunette seated herself and leaned over the table, practically glaring as a waitress made her way over.

"What?"

Kara leaned back against the booth, hands behind her head, with a smugness twinkling in her blue eyes.

"Well, obviously you haven't had great sex yet," she said loudly, right as the waitress reached their table. The uniformed woman let out a little squeak of surprise, and Lena was quick to send her on her way with an order for two waters and the menus.

She waited until the woman was out of sight. "Yes, I have," she murmured.

"No, you haven't."

"It just so happens that I've had plenty of great sex!" She hissed right as the waitress returned with two menus. Lena felt her cheeks pinken as the woman nearly threw the menus onto the table before scurrying off.

"Alright," Kara relented, picking one up and perusing it disinterestedly. "With whom?"

"What?"

"With whom have you had this great sex?" she pressed, using air-quotes.

Lena hid behind her menu. "I'm not going to tell you that!"

Kara shrugged. "OK, fine. Don't tell me."

There was another long, awkward pause. Lena was suddenly not hungry anymore; her eyes drifted to the dessert section, but every so often peered over the plastic border of the menu to stare at Kara with utter indignance. She slapped the menu back on the table.

"Agnes Gordon."

Kara laughed. "Agnes? Aggie? Nah. I'm sorry, but you so did not have great sex with Agnes."

"Did too!"

"Nuh-uh," Kara waved a finger close to her face. "An 'Agnes' can do your taxes. If you want to find a house in a good school district or a lively knitting group, Agnes is your gal. Between the sheets? Not Agnes' strong suit. Can you imagine?" Her voice climbed to an infuriating falsetto. "'Oh, I love you Agnes; do it to me, Aggie, I can't get enough of you, Agnes.' It just doesn't work."

Lena wanted to interject, but this time she clocked the waitress returning with their waters. The woman gingerly placed their cups on the table, levelling them with an awkward look.

"What can I get you?"

"I'll have the Number Five." Kara said, sliding the menu over.

"What kind of bread do you want that on?"

Kara flashed a smile. "Surprise me!"

The waitress responded in kind before turning to Lena. "How about you, dear?"

"I'd like the pie à la mode."

"Apple... à la mode..."

"But I'd like the pie heated, and I don't want the ice cream on top, I'd like it on the side. I'd prefer strawberry instead of vanilla if you have it. If not, then no ice-cream, just whipped cream, but only if it's real. If it's out of a can, then nothing."

The waitress blinked, gripping her pencil and notepad in a white-knuckled grip. "Not even the pie?"

"No, just the pie. But then, not heated."

The waitress gaped a little before crossing out something in her notepad and taking their menus, leaving their table with a bit of a forced smile.

Lena turned back to Kara, only to find the blonde looking at her with utter disbelief.

"What?"

Kara shook her head forcefully. "Nothing, never mind. So, how come you broke up with Agnes?"

"How do you know we broke up?"

"Pfft. If you didn't, you wouldn't be with me, you'd be with Agnes the Wonder Woman."

Lena scowled. "First of all, I'm not with you. Second of all, it's none of your business why we broke up."

"You're right, you're right. I don't even want to know."

There was a beat, and Lena inwardly cursed Kara for managing to get under her skin so easily.

"If you must know, it was because she was insanely jealous, and I had these Day of the Week underpants, so..."

Kara suddenly slammed her palm on the table, loud enough for several patrons to turn to their table in alarm as she made a loud buzzer sound.

"Eeeeeh! Hold on, hold on, judge's ruling on this. Explain. Days of the Week underpants?"

Lena nodded, glaring at the few people still staring. "Yeah. They had the days of the week on them. Lucy gave them to me, she thought they were funny. One day, Agnes says to me, 'you never wear Sunday.' She got all suspicious. Where was Sunday? Where had I left Sunday?"

"And?" Kara prompted, looking enthralled.

"And I told her, but she didn't believe me."

"What?"

"They don't make Sunday."

"What? Why not?"

Lena could only shrug. "Because of God, I guess."

"And that's why you broke up?"

"Yes."

Kara's laughter was loud and rambunctious. Her shoulders shook with it, and it was infectious; Lena soon found herself joining in, because it was ridiculous.

She was wiping a tear of laughter out of her eye when Kara bombarded her again.

"So, how many people have you slept with?"

She sobered up immediately. "What?"

"Just women? Or men, too?"

"Both," Lena responded before she could think better of it.

"OK, how many?"

"I'm not going to tell you that."

"Okay, fine. Don't tell me."

Lena rapped her fingers on the table, knowing she was being bated but unable to resist it. "Two."

Kara snorted. "Two? Two of each, or two total, one of each?"

The brunette furrowed her brows. "One of each."

"Ha!" Kara barked. "So you've been with a total of two people, and you're telling me based on two people that you know whether or not you've had great sex? Sorry, but your sample size is lacking."

Lena rolled her eyes. "Well, how many have you slept with? Men, women, both?"

"Women," Kara drawled. "Exclusively women. And I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?"

The blonde shrugged. "I just don't know."

"Well, is it between zero and three? Four and ten? Or ten and a hundred?" Lena asked, leaning over to scrutinize the blonde's face a little closer.

Kara crossed her arms. "Ten to a hundred."

"Is it closer to ten or closer to a hundred?"

"Eh, closer to ten."

Lena's follow-up was interrupted by the waitress, bringing in a solitary piece of pie and Kara's enormous sandwich.

They tucked in, and the conversation was forgotten. Lena bit into her pie and scowled.

"Ah, man, they heated it!"

Kara snorted.

Lena picked dejectedly at her pie while she waited for it to cool, while Kara scarfed down her sandwich and the accompanying fries with a speed that was frankly appalling as far as the brunette was concerned.

When the check came, Kara simply tossed a twenty on the table. Lena gave her a look, and began counting the bills in her wallet to give the exact change of her meal plus a not-so-generous tip, since her pie came heated, after all.

She felt Kara staring at her.

"What?" Kara kept staring, and she wiped at her face. "What? Do I have something on my face?"

"You're a very attractive woman."

Lena gaped, stunned. "Oh. Thank you."

Kara leaned over. "Lucy never told me you were so attractive."

"Maybe Lucy doesn't think I'm attractive," Lena reasoned with a cocked eyebrow.

Kara shook her head, smiling. "Nope, not a matter of opinion. Empirically speaking, you are attractive."

Lena shifted uncomfortably in her seat, leaning away from the blonde. "Kara. Lucy is my friend."

She got up, tossing her money onto the table and walking away. Kara scrambled to catch up. "So?

Lena walked determinedly to the car. "So, you're going with her."

"So?"

Lena stopped abruptly at their parking space. "Do I really have to explain this to you? Don't come on to me while you're going with my friend!"

"I wasn't coming onto you."

Lena scoffed, unlocking the car and dropping into the driver's seat with a huff. Kara quickly followed to the passenger seat, leaning over obnoxiously into Lena's space. "What? Can't I say a woman is attractive without it being a come-on? Not every lesbian is out to sleep with you, y'know."

Lena stared, and Kara raised her hands. "Alright, alright. Let's just say—for the sake of argument—that it was a come-on. What do you want me to do, take it back? Alright, I take it back. I take it back!"

"You can't just take it back!"

"Why not?"

"Because! It's already out there."

There was an awkward pause. Kara clutched a hand to her chest dramatically. "Oh, golly, you're right. What are we supposed to do now? Should we call the cops? It's already out there."

"Just... let it lie, okay?"

"Okie-dokie, let it lie. That's my policy, let it lie. Let it lie."

There was another pause, and Kara smirked. "So, do you want to spend the night in the motel?"

Lena wanted to bang her head on the steering wheel, and Kara continued. "See what I did? I didn't let it lie."

"Kara..."

"I said I would, and then I didn't-"

"Kara..."

"I went the complete opposite way-"

"Kara."

"Yes?"

Lena let out a deep breath. "We are just going to be friends, alright?"

Kara nodded, leaning back into her seat and propping her feet on the dashboard. "Yeah, great, okay. Friends. Best thing."

Lena started pulling out and away from the rest-top, ready to breathe a sigh of relief. It was not meant to be.

"You realize, of course," Kara began again, stretching as far as her seatbelt would allow, "that we can never be friends."

Lena was inclined to agree, but opted for politeness. "What do you mean?"

"What I'm saying is, and this is not a come-on, is that now that the sex thing is out there, it's always going to hover. It's going to get in the way. No one can be friends with the sex thing in the way."

"That's not true," Lena argued. "I'm friends with people I've had sex with."

"Yeah," Kara snorted. "All two of them. But seriously, you're not."

"I am."

"No. You only think you are."

"Are you saying I'm not friends with them because I've had sex with them?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying. Even if you hadn't had sex with them—once the possibility, or the mere thought of sex is out there, friendship becomes an impossibility. Because someone in the equation wants to have sex with the other person."

"They do not."

"Do too."

"Do not."

"Do too."

"How do you know?"

"Because if someone in the equation finds the other person attractive, sex thoughts get in the way. Someone wants to have sex, and are therefore any potential friendship is ruined."

Lena scoffed. "What if they don't want to have sex with you?"

Kara shook her head, looking mightily amused. "Doesn't matter. The sex thing is already out there, so the friendship is ultimately doomed. End of story."

Lena's lips pursed into a line. "Well. I guess we're not going to be friends, then."

"I guess not. My hypothetical come-on ruined it all, I'm sorry," Kara quipped, not sounding sorry in the slightest.

"That's too bad," Lena said. There was a short pause. "You'd be the only person I'd know in National City."

The car pulled into New York with the first rays of sunshine illuminating the George Washington bridge. It was an unbelievably beautiful day as Kara drove up to the curb overlooking the square. She popped the trunk and left to gather her things; Lena left her seat to take over the wheel.

Kara hefted her two duffel bags onto one shoulder with very little effort and slammed the trunk shut. She turned to Lena.

"Well, it was nice knowing you."

Lena chuckled. "Yeah. It was... interesting."

"Yeah. Thanks for the ride!"

"You're welcome."

Kara nodded, and Lena nodded back. It was as awkward as the start of their journey, and Lena offered her hand. Kara took it—her palms were sweaty again, and they shook hands.

"Well," Lena quipped. "Have a nice life."

Kara's smile went from ear to ear, her brow raised jovially like she was in on a secret. "You too."