You know the darker the day, the more you shine

first post!

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A relevant highlight

Although most Americans have eschewed seasonal COVID-19 vaccines, the updated shots continue to show significant protection against cardiovascular disease, especially for those over age 75 and those with underlying medical conditions. 

I have (unfortunately) had to make many long road trips before (mostly around 7hr but some up to 25hr) USUALLY with some kind of minor catastrophe, so, please be sure to consider:

-could you have a conversation with this person for an entire day/would mutual silence be comfortable ?

-would this person play driving games/read all billboards and would this piss you off or vice versa?

-would they take turns paying for gas?

-how frequently are they gonna need to pee?

-does their taste of music make you want to cry? do they listen to podcasts and if so, ones you tolerate?

-are you gonna want to be around them for another 10hrs after 10hrs in a car together ?

-could they handle an emergency/do they know how to change a tire?

-will they take turns driving and/or will their driving terrify you?

highly dependent on the results and my capacity for creativity (and shoulder/wrist/neck) but I would love to draw this or write it out because road trips are so often chaotic as fuck and I find thinking about The Characters (whose stakes are usually 1000x higher) in silly situations. Also I’ve been meaning to make that post about their cars…….

Kara’s surprised when, just before sunset on July Fourth, Lena leans in and whispers low into her ear. “Take me to Mount Norquay.” In fact, she’s shocked.

She takes long enough to formulate words in response that Lena gives a soft smile as she continues. “I know. But… trust me?”

That it’s the site of their most dire confrontation seems almost arbitrary, given how quickly Kara murmurs back, “Okay.”

They linger only long enough for Lena snag a pair of folded blankets from the couch before Kara opens her arms in invitation. Lena smoothly steps into them, looping her arms around Kara with familiar ease. Kara takes her time flying them there, sensing no urgency and all too conscious of the precious cargo she carries.

In five minutes they set down on the helipad built onto the side of the mountain face, and Kara takes a deep breath before facing the facility’s hangar door, and whatever anti-kryptonian weaponry that lay within.

Except Lena takes her hand in a gentle grip, and tugs her towards the edge of the landing zone. “This way.”

Kara follows, confused. She watches as Lena spreads one blanket on the ground and settles down on top of it. She keeps herself on this side of the guardrail, but lets her feet dangle off the side. Looping one end of the second blanket over her shoulders, she offers the other half to Kara.

“Sit with me?”

She does. Once their shoulders brush beneath the blanket, Kara glances at Lena in curiosity. “Lena, what are we doing here?”

A small smile curls Lena’s lips, but she keeps her gaze focused on the glittering skyline of National City. “Just wait.”

Something about the peace in Lena’s voice and the silky stillness of the night around them makes Kara’s decision easy. She settles in, and waits.

Only a few minutes later, the first bloom of a firework appears over the city’s shoreline—the start of the annual fireworks display at the city harbor. One after another, blossoms of colored light erupted in the distance, long before the faint pops of the first fireworks reach Kara’s ears.

“You know… I love how fireworks look on tv,” Kara confesses. “But in person they’re pretty unbearable. Too loud, too unpredictable. I used to hide under my bed when I was a kid. One year, Alex tried to drown them out with heavy metal music blasting at full volume, but that only made me puke.”

When she looks at Lena then, Lena’s gaze is already on her, watching. She observes Lena’s  lack of surprise, confusion and curiosity, and then grins sheepishly. “Which you’ve already gathered, it seems…” she trails off. In that moment, Kara realizes that’s precisely why they’re here. “Oh.”

“It’s not lost on me that I thought of possibly the last place you’d want to come back to,” Lena acknowledges, “but it’s the only place I could think of that would give us a vantage point far enough out from the city.”

The reminder of that night echoes between them. The chill air around Kara sends her back to the memory of her hovering in front of the charging kryptonite cannons, heart pounding as she prayed that she hadn’t actually lost Lena entirely.

“I had to hack into the system to deactivate those cannons,” Lena continued. Her voice was soft and low, almost reverent. “They were operating on some automatic defense program Lex had left running.”

Kara blinked. “Oh.” She’d been relieved that Lena had backed down, and ultimately deactivated the cannons, but she hadn’t questioned who’d been the one pointing them at her. After all she’d done….

“I know we lost our way,” Lena says. “And I can’t say that I didn’t want to hurt you… but I didn’t. I couldn’t. Wouldn’t.” Her gaze turns out towards the city, where the fireworks were coming in closer succession. “From the very start, I had your back.” When her gaze slides back, Kara holds it. “I just hope you’ll trust that I always will.”

Tears burn against the backs of Kara’s eyes. She wants to pull Lena close, cling to her, kiss her. But she only allows herself to wrap one arm around Lena’s shoulders, and revel in the warmth of Lena’s proximity. A proximity which, in that interminable moment months ago, had seemed impossible to reclaim.

“I’m sorry,” Kara says.

They’d put an unspoken moratorium on apologies months ago, but Lena doesn’t scold her. Instead she simply sighs, and melts into Kara a little more.

“Me too.”

oh wow the glass-tower office buildings we constructed when we thought air conditioning and central heating would never have downsides...have downsides?

and we're still building them?

while the Victorian house museum where I work, with thick walls and small windows and big wooden shutters stays ~10 degrees above (winter) or below (summer) the outside temperature for days on end with no help at all?

uh. okay then

ABSOLUTE CASSANDRA CAIN ONE-SHOT!!!11!!

Full art of Absolute Cass:

(Almost) Everything You Need to Know About T and Fertility

As a trans person, how can I navigate authentic gender expression and avoid the identity police?

The Second Guesser’s Guide to Hormone Therapy

How to Develop Body Trust When Trans: An Introduction

How to Support A Friend or Partner Who’s Dealing With Gender Dysphoria

Dating and Gender Roles when One Partner is Trans

It's a Trap: How to Spot Anti-Trans Resources

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