311. Chapter 311

She’s not wearing her vest when she gets shot.

She’s not wearing her vest and the bullet just misses collapsing her lung and she’s in surgery for eight hours.

Eight hours during which it takes the combined strength of the Martian Manhunter and Supergirl to keep Alex from torturing and killing the man who shot her.

Despite their unearthly strength, Alex still gets a few solid hits in.

She tries to wash off most of his blood before they finally tell her that her girlfriend is in recovery, that she can go see her (J'onn and Kara had delivered a few carefully worded threats about the hospital’s “family only” policy ahead of Alex’s arrival, mainly to prevent Alex from straight up murdering a nurse or physician’s assistant).

“Danvers.”

Maggie’s voice is groggy and unfocused, but it’s her voice, it’s her voice, it’s her voice.

“Hey.” Alex’s voice is hoarse from eight hours of screaming and raspy with unshed tears and quaking with she’s alive, she’s okay, she’s okay.

“You look like you’ve been through hell,” Maggie whispers like she’s not the one with oxygen tubes in her nose and IVs in her veins and stitches holding her torso together.

“You were touch and go for a while,” is Alex’s only explanation, and tears flood Maggie’s eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

“What? No. No, Maggie, you have nothing to – why would you – Maggie, please don’t apologize, I should be, I wasn’t there to protect you – ”

“It was a routine patrol, Danvers. It’s fine. I’m fine. I’m not going anywhere, okay? I’m fine.”

And she is, she is – Alex has to repeat it like an unending mantra in her head – but her recovery is going to be long, and if Alex thought Maggie was stubborn before, she reaches a whole new level with this.

Because she’s not supposed to walk unassisted.

But Alex catches her getting up to go to the bathroom alone in the middle of the night because “you looked so peaceful sleeping, Danvers.”

And she’s not supposed to change her own bandages, but Alex catches her trying anyway, because “Why should you have all the fun, Danvers?”

And she’s supposed to take her pain meds regularly, but Alex finds the bottle just as full as she left it when she headed out to the DEO, because “They get me loopy and it’s whatever, it’s just a flesh wound at this point.”

“Maggie. I need you to listen to me, and I need you to try and hear me. Okay?”

Maggie gulps because she thinks she knows what’s coming, and her lip trembles and she clenches her jaw because who wants to be with someone who’s gonna take so long to recover from a stupid injury, who wants to be stuck in the house when she could be playing pool, making out, with someone else?

Someone who’s not scared of getting addicted to the pain meds, someone who doesn’t need the damn things to begin with?

“I know you don’t like talking about yourself. And I know you don’t know how to be taken care of. Because I don’t think anyone’s ever really taken care of you. But I want to, Maggie. I want to take care of you. That’s what I’m here for. But I need you to not sabotage that, okay? You have to let your body heal, okay? You have to try and trust me, just a little bit, just enough to take care of you while you’re still healing up. And then you can go back to pretending you can kick my ass at sparring.”

“I can, I can do it right now, Danvers – ”

Alex laughs and Maggie cracks the first real grin she’s had in days.

“You’re not mad at me?”

“Maggie, how could I possibly be mad at you?”

Maggie’s lip wobbles and her jaw clenches and she looks away.

“I’m all needy, and… and boring.”

Alex sighs and lays down next to her, tossing the covers over both of them and propping herself up on a stack of pillows. She grabs at the remote and puts her arm around Maggie’s shoulders and snuggles her close, flipping on Netflix as she kisses Maggie’s temple.

“Mandatory bed rest, Netflix, comfy pillows, and an even comfier girlfriend? How could I ever be bored, Maggie?”

The next time she has to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, she pokes Alex awake timidly and lets her help her hobble inside.

The next time she has to change her bandages, she watches how gentle, how loving, how attentive, how skilled, Alex’s hands are, and she makes Alex blush with a series of comments about her hot doctor girlfriend.

The next time she needs pain meds, she lets Alex regulate her amount and makes sure she eats and has plenty of water.

And the next time she feels like she doesn’t deserve to be taken care of, like it’s just a flesh wound and she should be able to take care of it all herself, she lets Alex kiss her and whisper sweet everythings in her ear, and she lets Alex help her heal.