#mike-wachowski

Kara swallows and nods, almost too quickly. Lena smiles, bending forwards to slip her shoes back on. She stands, brushing off the skirt of her dress, and she only sways slightly when she offers Kara a hand.

None of the remaining members of their party seem to notice them slip out, and then they’re half-stumbling down an empty hallway, hands swinging between them and shoulders bumping as they pull each other along. Kara lifts their joined hands for Lena to spin, and cackles when Lena manages to trip over her own shoe. Lena guides them to a back staircase, and they race up several flights until they reach a service exit that leads onto the roof.

“Oof, my calves,” Lena says, leaning forwards to catch her breath, her hands on her knees. “Remind me not to run up stairs in heels next time.”

Kara spins around, arms open, breathing the night air deep into her lungs. The building they’re standing on top of is one of the tallest of those around it, and provides an excellent view of the rooftops of National City. Buildings stretch out around them, lights twinkling in thousands of windows. On the road far below, cars the size of toys roll by, and the occasional honk or shout drifts up on the night breeze, a nighttime city symphony.

It’s a view that Kara’s seen a million times, from a million different angles, and yet it still squeezes some part of her heart every time.

She turns back towards Lena, who’s watching her take in the skyline with a quiet sort of smile on her face, and that’s another view that squeezes her heart no matter how many times she looks at it. A view she's memorized, knows every detail to, could retrace in her sleep. She thinks she actually forgot how to breathe when she first saw Lena tonight, black fabric flush with her curves, her eyes sparkling under dark liner.

“Did I tell you you look stunning tonight?” Kara asks, skipping back over to take Lena by the hands. “This dress is really, really something… and your hair! And your makeup! Just your everything. Your everything looks good. I mean, your everything usually looks good, but the outfit is really…” She shakes her head, trying to stop rambling, but Lena doesn’t seem to mind, just grins and ducks her head, the tips of her ears pink.

“Thank you,” she says, a little shy. “You look very cute, too. Your dress is very…” Her eyebrows scrunch as she considers Kara’s outfit, and she chews on her lip like she’s trying to find something to say that isn't offensive.

Kara laughs, dropping Lena’s hands to twirl for her, skirt ruffling out around her. “What, you don’t like it?”

Lena tilts her head. “Mm, it’s very… teal. And sparkly. And… ruffled.”

“It is, in fact, all of those things,” Kara smiles, taking Lena’s hands again. She leans in close. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“What?” Lena whispers, mirroring her so their foreheads are almost touching.

“Esme picked it out for me. She said it was the prettiest dress ever and that I had to wear it to the bachelorette party.”

Lena lets out a loud laugh, clapping a hand over her mouth to try and stifle it.

“How was I supposed to say no that face?” Kara says. “Have you seen her puppy dog eyes? Don’t let the innocence fool you, she’s very manipulative. And then she told me that auntie Lena would think I looked very pretty, with that little mischievous smirk of hers.”

“She’s pretty hard to refuse,” Lena agrees, eyes twinkling. “Though I think auntie Lena would think you looked pretty no matter what you were wearing, so I’m not sure the dress was necessary in that respect.”

“She—you would?” Kara says, and Lena’s smiling at her, all fondness, and she’s so pretty that it hurts.

“I would.”

Kara stares at her, trying to formulate a response, but Lena keeps running her thumb over Kara’s knuckles, and her perfume is kind of making Kara dizzy, and Kara can almost see her pulse thrumming in her throat. “We should dance,” she finally blurts out.

“Dance?” Lena frowns, her thumb pausing on Kara’s knuckles. “There’s no music. We’re on the roof.”

“We don’t need music!” Kara says, tugging Lena into the middle of the roof. “We can dance without it.”

“I can’t dance, Kara,” Lena says, taking her hand back and pulling her arms in close to her chest. “You know that. And I think I already reached my quota for trying earlier.”

“You can. I believe you can! You’re just too stiff, you know? You always hold all your limbs really tense and you kind of just… like shuffle.”

“So you’re saying I am bad at dancing.”

“I’m saying you need to let loose a little. Like, here, put your arms out like this.” Kara sticks both of her arms straight out, and Lena rolls her eyes but copies the motion. “Good, now just like… spin in circles.”

“Spin—Kara what?” Lena says, half dropping her arms.

“Just do it!” Kara yells, already starting to spin. “There’s no one here to see you but me!”

She hears Lena’s amused huff of disbelief, but when she catches a glimpse of Lena on her next rotation she’s spinning too, arms extended, around and around across the concrete surface of the roof. They spin and spin, the city a blur of lights and buildings and night around them, and Kara’s hair flies out behind her, threaded with night air, and Lena’s laughing somewhere nearby, musical. It’s exhilarating in the same way as flying for the first time.

“Okay, and… stop!” Kara finally yells, wobblily slowing down and keeping her arms extended to steady herself. Lena stumbles directly into her, gasping between her laughter, and Kara has to grab both her arms to stop her from falling over.

“Maybe that’ll loosen you up a bit,” Kara says, and Lena beams up at her, her cheeks flushed.

“I think it just made me dizzy.”

“Good. That’s the first step. Now just copy my dance moves! The trick is to just let your limbs do whatever they want, you know? Like this.”

When Lena’s no longer seems in danger of collapsing onto the concrete, Kara frees her arms and starts waving them around like she’s dancing to imaginary music, swaying her hips and shimmying her shoulder along. Lena copies her movements, somewhat uncertain at first, but Kara just makes her dancing more and more ridiculous until Lena’s laughing too hard to be self-conscious. They probably look like idiots, spinning and dancing and waving their arms around on the roof of a skyscraper in the middle of the night, and Kara certain it’s a memory she’ll revisit again and again, in quiet moments, in sad ones, in happy ones.

“Perfect!” Kara says, when she feels Lena has mastered the art of wiggly arms. “Excellent! Wait, okay, now we slow dance.” She grabs Lena’s hand again, pulling her in close, and Lena complies easily, resting her hands on Kara’s shoulder. Without ever really deciding to, Kara starts humming the song that was playing when they left the party, a song she doesn’t remember the title of but has a deep sort of romantic nostalgia ingrained in the very fibers of its tune.

Lena’s looking up at her, the laughter faded from her face, and Kara can hear the flutter of her heartbeat, can feel it where her arms are wrapped tight around Lena’s waist. They’re barely dancing anymore, just swaying in each other’s arms, so close they’re nearly pressed together, and Kara’s humming stops, her breath catching in her throat.

She remembers the title of the song. Elvis. Can’t Help Falling in Love.

“You know what I was thinking when I was watching Kelly and Alex dance earlier?” Lena asks, her voice so soft that despite her superhearing, Kara instinctually leans closer to hear it. “I was watching them dance and they looked so unbearably happy together and I was trying to just be happy for them but I couldn’t stop thinking… that could be us. I mean, if we wanted it to be. Dancing together like there’s no one else in the room. Deliriously, obnoxiously happy. It could be.”

“Do you want it to be?” Kara says, clinging to her words, hardly daring to believe they’re real. Everything around them seems to have muted, the world narrowing down until there’s nothing but them, nothing but the seconds that pass as she waits for Lena’s response.

Slowly, like she’s unveiling some deeply hidden secret, Lena nods. “Yes, I think I do. I want that with you. I want everything with you. I want us to be stupidly happy. I think maybe… I think maybe we deserve it, after everything.”

And Kara smiles, reaching up to touch Lena’s cheek. She leans in close enough to feel Lena’s breath warm against her lip. “Yeah,” she whispers, lips almost brushing Lena’s. “The feeling is mutual.”