501. Chapter 501

She doesn’t hear her first name spoken out loud until she’s fourteen years old.

People say her first name, of course.

They say it every day.

She can see it, and all its variations – Alex, Alexandra, Lexie – but she can’t hear it.

And she won’t.

Not until it rolls off of the lips of her soulmate.

So when her new sister tries out her name in a tongue that’s foreign to her, on a planet that’s foreign to her, she cries and she yells and she rages and she slams doors.

Because if this weird little girl from another planet is her soulmate?

How will she ever find romantic love?

Jeremiah finds her hours later – sitting on her surfboard on the beach, soaking wet – and Jeremiah smooths her hair away from her tear- and salt-stained face.

“The only people who can hear it when their siblings or parents or something say their names are the ones who are doomed to be alone,” she chokes, and Jeremiah shakes his head as he draws her closer into his chest.

“Don’t, I’m drenched,” she protests, but he just chuckles and kisses her sopping hair.

“It’s an amazing thing, Alex. That Kara’s your soulmate. To have someone as special as someone’s sister be their soulmate? That’s amazing, sport. Just like you. I was worried – your mom, too – when Clark called us. That you and Kara wouldn’t get along. But apparently, you’ll get along just fine.”

Alex perks up slightly. “But maybe it’s not the same with aliens. Maybe the same rules don’t apply.”

Jeremiah tousles her hair and shakes his head again. “Sorry, kiddo. I can’t hear it when she says my name. Guess she’s not my soulmate.”

“But then I’ll never have a boyfriend! Or…”

“Or a girlfriend?” Jeremiah asks gently, and Alex sniffles and won’t meet his eyes.

“Alex, lots of people date and even marry people who they can’t hear their name from. Happy people. Good relationships. And anyway, there’s no rule on how many soulmates someone can have. Don’t give up, champ. Okay?”

She agrees.

She agrees but then his plane crashes, and she breaks her promise.

She gives up.

Gives up on everyone – including herself.

Everyone except Kara.

Because Kara is her light and Kara is her world. And hearing Kara say her name – actually hearing her name off someone else’s lips – always feels like a miracle.

Kara always says Alex is the reason she doesn’t feel alone on this earth.

Alex feels the same thing about her sister.

She just gives up on the hopeful thrum of her heart when she introduces herself to someone new, when they greet her by name, when she sees their lips move and hope her ears will hear something to match. But no.

Nothing.

Ever.

Kara is her soulmate. And that’s more than enough for her.

But then there’s this arrogant local cop on her tarmac.

Then there’s this beautiful woman, this miracle of a woman, and Alex finds herself wishing things she shouldn’t wish.

This woman calls her by her last name only, and Alex wonders if it’s a defense mechanism she’s developed. Protection she’s developed.

Because if she never says anyone’s first name, no one will ever know if she’s their soulmate.

But Alex falls for her anyway. Alex dives into her anyway.

Alex comes out and Alex tells Kara and Alex takes her by the arm and pulls her close into her body and she kisses her, and it doesn’t matter that she already has her sister as a soulmate, because that kiss, god, that kiss is what love should feel like, isn’t it?

But Maggie says no and Maggie rejects her, and Alex needs to bawl, she needs to drink, she needs to disappear into herself, but then she hears something she never thought she’d hear. Not ever.

“Alex, don’t go,” Maggie calls after her, and Alex freezes, and she turns, and she no longer knows which way is up.

“What did you just say?”

“Don’t go?”

“No. I… your whole sentence. What was your whole sentence?”

“Alex, don’t go?”

Again.

She hears her name rolling off this perfect woman’s lips again.

“What, did you… you heard me, didn’t you? Say your first name.”

Alex stands and she stares and she doesn’t know whether to kiss her again or to run far, far away.

“But I… I can hear it when my sister says my name – “

“We can have more than one soulmate, Danvers. Alex.”

Tears flood her eyes, this time, and she thinks she sees them dancing in Maggie’s, too.

“Say it again?” she whispers, and Maggie smiles despite herself. Despite her terror.

“Alex.”

Alex purses her lips and glances down at Maggie’s, but then she shakes her head and she throws up her defenses and she remembers her agony.

“But you don’t want me, you – “

“No, Alex, that’s not why I said no, I… I don’t want to hurt you, Danvers. Okay?”

“Why? Because you can’t hear it when I say your name?”

Maggie tilts her head and grins lopsidedly.

“You’ve never tried to say it, Danvers.”

Alex blinks. She calls her Maggie in her head, definitely. But she thinks back… out loud, she’s developed the same habit as Maggie has. Always titles. Always last names.

Maybe the only time she’s ever said Maggie’s first name out loud is in the moments before sleep, alone, in her dreams, together…

“You won’t hurt me, Maggie. I trust you.”

Maggie’s eyes fly wide, and there are definitely tears in them this time.

“You heard it, didn’t you?” Alex whispers, wondering if this is what flight feels like for Kara.

“You shouldn’t trust me,” Maggie rasps, but Alex does, she does, and Maggie doesn’t object, can’t object, doesn’t want to object, when Alex cups her face in her hands again, puts her lips on hers again.

And this time, she lets herself kiss her back.

Because Alex can hear it when she says her first name.

And Maggie can hear it when Alex says hers.

And that?

That, and this woman – this amazing, gorgeous woman – might be worth the risk, after all.