777. Chapter 777

She doesn’t understand why she’s so weak.

J’onn lost his entire family, his entire planet, to genocide.

Kara lost her entire family, her entire planet, to an arrogant mistake her parents insisted on making.

Winn’s father was in prison for murdering people, James’s father was dead, Lena’s and Maggie’s parents were…

Well, maybe she had a little in common with these guys, with the parent issues.

But still.

Her mother was alive and loved her, accepted her, even when she got things wrong. Even her father was alive, trying to love her (albeit doing it badly) after all these years.

She doesn’t understand, if all these people could be so strong, every day and every night and every moment in between, why she was so comparatively weak and whiny.

Because she had a long, hard day ahead of her, so what? She didn’t want to get out of bed?

Lots of people had long, hard days ahead of them. And worse. Unimaginable things.

Kara and J’onn woke up every day knowing their entire history was gone.

And Alex couldn’t even deal with the basics of life.

Weak.

Maggie apparently disagreed. Which, for some parts of her, made it better. For other parts of her, it made it so much worse.

To have a doting, wonderful girlfriend, and still not be able to function like a regular person?

How ungrateful and oversensitive could she possibly be?

But there was Maggie, bringing her coffee and sitting at the side of their massive bed, stroking her hair and kissing her temple.

“Take your time getting up, Danvers. There’s no rush.”

Except there was a rush, and Maggie knew it. The more momentum Alex gave to this bullshit, the harder it would be to get up, eventually.

And she knew she would, eventually. So why couldn’t she just speed up the damn process and get on with it?

“Yeah there is,” she grunted back at Maggie, who tilted her head, squinted her eyes, and considered the rebuttal.

“Arguably, there’s always a rush. But then doesn’t that mean there’s never a rush?”

“Nerd.”

“You love me.”

Alex sighed. “I do. And I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’ll get up, I just-”

“Hey, Danvers, shhh. I meant it, sweetie. No rush. Your body’s got things it needs to process. Let it. It’s alright. I’m here. You don’t have to ride it out alone.”

Which was precisely when the tears started.

She fought them hard, but they fought harder, and her eyes burned.

“Kara gets up every day. J’onn. Everyone, damn. You know Johnson in engineering lost his mother last week? His own mother, and he’s back, and he’s doing what needs to be done, but I’m just stuck here, absolutely nothing wrong in my life, whining about nothing, and it - I can’t - ”

Alex’s rant became a struggle to breathe, and Maggie scuttled down next to her, holding her through it and whispering wordlessly into her ear.

“You know,” she said slowly, softly, when Alex started breathing again, “I was actually talking to Johnson the other day. When I came in after that last attack. And he was telling me that every night, he goes home and is just catatonic. And his boyfriend has to make sure he eats, sometimes even spoon-feeding him, to make sure.”

Alex looked up at that, tears fresh in her eyes. “God, that’s-”

“That’s not what you see when you look at him at work. And it’s not what other people see when they look at you at work. But even if it were, Alex. Even the days when Kara wears her losses on her sleeve, and J’onn goes to war like he’s fighting for people long dead? They fight with their brain stuff every day. They’re allowed, and you’re allowed. And you know better than anyone how Kara goes through the same kinds of mornings you do. It’s easy to forget, when that’s not the side of ourselves we talk about all the time. You’re not by yourself with this, babe. Hell, you’ve seen me like this, more times than I can count.”

“But you’re not making it up, you’re not-”

“Hey.” Maggie’s voice was stern, this time, and Alex found her eyes, fearful she’d said something vitally wrong. But Maggie just took her face between her cupped hands, and kissed her solid and tender on the mouth. “You are not making anything up, Alex Danvers. You’re suffering. You’re not electing to suffer because it’s fun. Because it’s not. You’re suffering because your body’s on overload, your heart’s on overload. And we can manage it together, I promise, but don’t you dare try to tell yourself you’re making it up, that it’s your fault. You can’t talk about the woman I love like that, okay?”

“Wait, who was I talking about?”

Smiles crept onto the faces of both women as Maggie rolled her eyes and leaned in for another soft kiss. “You, Danvers. I love you.”

“As it should be,” Alex teased, and when she realized the implications of what she’d said - that she did, indeed, deserve Maggie’s love - her chest wracked with another sob.

But it was the good kind, now. The kind that reminded her that she would be able to get up and do this again. Because she might be exhausted, but she wasn’t alone.