638. Chapter 638
She told her she had a friend to stay with.
And she could have.
Could have crashed on her work partner’s couch. His wife wouldn’t have minded – she probably would have liked the company, honestly – and their kid would have been thrilled.
Their kid loves Maggie, and she loves their kid.
Their kid.
She doesn’t want to be around kids right now.
Because she loves kids, she just doesn’t… want them, for herself.
Because she loves kids, but she loves Alex more, but Alex doesn’t…
So she doesn’t call him. She doesn’t ask.
She just checks in at the Baldwin.
Where Emily had caught her cheating, all those years ago.
She chuckles masochistically to herself.
It’s fitting.
She’s through her third shot at the hotel bar when a familiar hand touches her shoulder.
“The hell are you doing here?” she asks, forgetting, for a moment, that she’s just lost everything, as she launches herself into M’gann’s arms. “I thought you were off leading a revolution.”
M’gann pulls back and holds her by the shoulders, searching her face like she’s searching for evidence of harm. To herself.
“Revolutions don’t mean anything unless we care for our own, Maggie. And you – “
“But I didn’t send you a message.”
Maggie blinks like the alcohol is finally starting to hit her brain, because it is.
M’gann just guides her back to her bar stool and taps at her own temple.
“Telepathy, remember?”
“Across all that space?”
“You love her that much,” M’gann says just above a whisper, and Maggie finally breaks.
She breaks forward into M’gann’s arms, breaks forward and breaks down, breaks up and breaks entirely.
“Shhhh, I know. I know,” M’gann whispers, running war-torn fingers through her hair and soft comforts through her wet cheeks.
The bartender grimaces in sympathy and pours them both free shots. M’gann mouths a thank you at him over Maggie’s shaking shoulder.
“I can’t… I can’t…”
“Shhhh, it’s okay. Take your time,” M’gann tells her, rubbing circles onto her back and peace into her stomach.
Maggie turns and downs the shot that’s appeared, to her, out of nowhere.
“She was my family. And she… I wasn’t enough for her. Wasn’t enough family for her. So she… she’s leaving me on the side of the road, and I can’t… I don’t know how to even stay in this city, with… we’re gonna still work the same cases, we’re… and her sister, I’m the NCPD’s liaison with… I can’t… M’gann, how am I going to do this?”
“You don’t have to do it alone,” a voice says softly, but it’s not M’gann’s.
Maggie jumps and wipes her eyes, her nose, rapidly before turning somewhat unsteadily.
“James, Winn, what the hell – “
“Hi Maggie,” Kara steps out from behind them, and her voice is small, her body even smaller.
“Kara?”
She says it like she’s talking through a dream, because she thinks maybe she is.
Kara doesn’t speak. She just strides forward and wraps Maggie in her arms.
“Listen, I have to… I have to go be with…”
“I know. I know you do.” Maggie’s heart wavers and she tries not to break. Again.
As she ponders whether someone who’s already completely broken can, technically, still break.
“But I wanted to just… you’re not alone, Maggie. You’re part of our family, and that…. that doesn’t change just because you guys…”
Maggie trembles and James takes her hand while Winn puts a hand on her thigh and M’gann rubs her back.
“Your sister dumped me,” she states tonelessly, and Kara’s eyes flood.
“She loves y – “
“No. No, no. Kara, I get it, I do, and I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I can’t hear that she… I can’t. It won’t help, it’s not… enough, apparently.”
“Maggie, that’s not what – “
“It is what it is, Little…. Little Danvers.” Her voice breaks on their last name – the last name she’d wanted to be hers – and she lets her head rest against Winn’s chest, because she has no other choice but to surrender.
“Maggie, my point is that you’re not alone, okay? You don’t have to do any of this alone. We don’t abandon family, okay?”
Maggie swallows thickly and nods tightly.
“Go. Be with her. Take good care of her, okay?”
Kara nods solemnly. “Always,” she promises, leaving Maggie with a broken heart and a family.
“So you told Alex you’re staying with a friend,” Winn says softly, and Maggie almost groans. But before she can object, he keeps talking, staring at his hands. “And you know, we don’t wanna make a liar out of you, Sawyer. Or rack up your credit card bill on this place, so uh… you know, my couch is extremely comfortable.”
There’s a pause and she doesn’t know if it’s the liquor or the tears that make her world almost spin out.
“Is it?” she croaks, somehow stable because of M’gann’s hand on her back, because of James’s steady eyes, because of Winn’s almost bashful offer of… a home.
“Sure is. And I have all the gaming systems you can dream of. Come stay with me. Please? You don’t have to be alone, you pool shark, you.”
She thinks about protesting. She thinks about insisting that she’s fine.
She thinks about lying and she thinks about pushing her feelings down and she thinks about Alex so she thinks about throwing up.
And then she thinks about family, and these people.
These people who somehow love her even after… after.
“Take me to your leader, Schott,” she manages, and James and Winn walk her out with their arms around her while M’gann picks up her luggage and brings around her space ship car.
Because J’onn isn’t the only one with cool toys, and because if Maggie’s heart is going to be broken, at least it can be broken with family and with a flying Mustang convertible soaring over the desert. Together.