Work Text:
Cat is barely ten minutes in when she loses her patience.
There are unorganized piles of documents threatening to spill over her desk, all the lights on her phone are blinking red with missed calls and voicemails and there’s not a single cup of coffee in sight.
“Oh for the love of …” Cat swears under her breath, already striding toward her desk.
The sound of her heels hitting the luxurious wooden floor is enough to induce the beginning of a migraine and, not for the first time, she misses the soft carpeted flooring of her carefully designed CatCo office. She drops her purse on the chair strategically placed in between two massive French doors and fishes out her phone and a glass case before moving to her desk. She turns her laptop on and takes one glance at the still blinking phone display before raising a hand to pinch the bridge of her nose, to try to alleviate the ever growing pain.
She slowly sits in her plush, comfortable chair and takes a deep breath before opening her mouth.
“DYLAN!”
She stares at the door across the room, waiting for her exceptionally incompetent assistant to show up.
She’s seething, clearly not having expected that level of sheer laziness and utter amateurism from the cohort of assistants she’s already gone through since she got here.
She would have thought that her position at the White House, as Olivia’s right hand, meant that she would get the best of the best, la crème de la crème but sadly, she’s been stuck with wannabe politician who could barely handle the phone. It is telling that James Olsen, who once manhandled the phone for her, did better than any of the poor, useless souls that she’s been stuck with and at a time, he’d been an editor in chief and awarded photographer.
The door finally opened and young man with short blond hair and deep blue eyes popped his head through, looking downright terrified.
“You called, Miss Grant?”
Cat notices how the pale blue color of his shirt, perfectly ironed and stretched around his tanned neck, clashes with the crimson red tie. That fashion mistake should be motive enough to fire him, Cat briefly thinks. Only Supergirl was able to pull off that god-awful combination of childish colors.
“Come on in,” Cat gestures for her assistant to approach the desk.
The man pales, and he looks like he wants to be anywhere else in the world, but he eventually closes the door behind him and takes a few steps into the office. His real name isn’t Dylan and Cat knows it but so far, no one had been competent enough to earn the right to be called by their actual name.
“Have a look, Dylan,” Cat distinctly enunciate the wrong name, knowing he won’t say anything about it. She gestures for her desk and asks “What do you see?”
The wrongly named Dylan glances down at the desk and frowns, looking utterly confused. He’s almost shaking, Cat can tell from the way he’s tightly holding his hands together in front of the buttoned jacket of his suit.
“Uh, Miss Grant?” Dylan asks, obviously not understanding the question.
Cat lets out a deep and aggravated sigh. She brings her hand to hoover above the blinking phone display and waits but nothing happens. The look of utter confusion in the man’s eyes only deepens.
“For God’s sake!” Cat sharply stands up and places her palms flat on the surface of her desk, leaning forward to be able to stare right into the man’s eyes. “The phone is exploding with missed calls and voicemails, there are piles and piles of paper stacked on my desk and where the hell is my coffee?”
That seems to finally sparkle something in the man’s eyes, a gleam of recognition. He looks almost relieved and then words spill out of his mouth.
“Oh, if it’s a coffee you want I can …”
Cat pinches the bridge of her nose again, closes her eyes and takes another deep breath.
She raises her other hand to signal for Dylan to stop talking. Thankfully, he’s not that obtuse as to ignore that order, and so she takes a moment to count backward in her head. When she finally reaches zero, she opens her eyes and stares into the terrified blue eyes.
“Pack up your things, you’re fired.”
She slowly sits back in her chair and with a typical flicker of her wrists, she finishes dismissing the new former assistant.
---
“Cat, it’s the tenth assistant you’ve fired,” Olivia sighs, accepting the heavy glass of Scotch her friend is handing her. “You’re only six months in the job and my chief of staff is already threatening to quit.”
Cat chuckles and comes to sit in front of the president, in one of the luxurious and comfortable armchairs that match the couch on which Olivia is settled. She’s got her own glass in her hand, half-full of a honey-ish beverage that gently swirls with every move her wrist makes.
“That’s because Russell doesn’t like me, it has nothing to do with the level of turn-over in my team,” She sarcastically retorts.
“Probably, but you still fired Donovan, who also happens to be the nephew of a senator I was hoping to get endorsed by …” Olivia reproaches before taking a sip of her drink. She hums appreciatively. “Oh, that’s good Scotch.”
“Zero fucks given. Next, please!” Cat retorts with a shrug.
That gets a reproving look from the President of the United States.
“Come on, Olivia. You know I don’t like nepotism and beside, that boy was utterly and desperately useless. He once announced that the French president was on the line for me but when I picked up, I got to talk with the king of Belgium …”
Olivia now looks positively horrified. She shakes her head, lets out another sigh and then decides to chase it all with another sip of Scotch.
For a moment, they stay quiet and enjoy their drink, as well as the soft music that plays in the background, a piece of Vivaldi’s four seasons.
The many high windows along the wall let in the fading light of the late summer day.
The skyline view is far away from the one she had from her penthouse in National City but it’s still decent enough so she can watch as Washington bathes in the golden halo of the late afternoon. On the other side of the sky, it’s already dark enough for a few stars to start twinkling.
“You know you won’t ever find someone as good as her, right?”
Olivia’s words are soft and gentle and when Cat tears her eyes away from the view, she falls into a pair of knowing brown eyes. She hates that her friend can read her so easily, but she doesn’t deny that she’s got a point.
“Oh, I know,” Cat whispers, trying not to be overloaded with memories of Kara. “I’m not trying to.”
“Aren’t you?” Olivia counters, leaning forward to place her glass on the coffee table in front of her.
“I’m not, I promise,” Cat nods, bringing her own drink to her lips and savoring a few sips before adding. “I have impossibly high standards but even I know that finding another Supergirl to be my assistant won’t be possible.”
An amused smiles graces Olivia’s lips at that, and she lets herself fall back against the cushions.
“Ah, so the cat’s out of the bag, so to speak …” Olivia muses, extending her arms on either side of her, along the slope of the couch. “I was wondering …”
Cat scrunches her nose and glares at her friend.
“You know I have cat puns,” Cat grits out, slightly annoyed that the President of the United States would even make one in the first place. “And yes, of course I knew. I’ve known since the very beginning but I figured that one day, she’d tell me herself ... "
“Careful, Cat, you sound bitter,” Olivia arches a brow, her smile still firmly in place.
“That’s because I am. I branded her, you know …” Cat retorts, standing up from her armchair and going to her liquor cabinet to pour herself another glass. “I helped Supergirl be the hero she is today, by giving her a name, a platform and a reputation, by protecting her identity … and she never told me who she really is.”
“That may be so, but she doesn’t owe you anything,” Olivia gently replies and when Cat rises the decanter in her direction, she simply shakes her head no. “Beside … you probably left before she got a chance to tell you.”
Cat replaces the alcohol atop her liquor cabinet and comes back to her previous spot to face her friend.
“I didn’t leave because of her,” Cat states, making the Scotch swirls at the bottom of her heavy crystal glass.
“No?” Olivia throws her a knowing look. “You could have fooled me …”
Cat grits her teeth and looks away to the falling night. More stars are now blinking in the sky, neighboring a shy crescent of moon while Washington slowly blurs into an indistinct shadow.
“You should call her, you know,” Olivia offers, checking the phone she just pulled out of her pocket. Whatever she sees on it has her frown.
“Everything alright?” Cat asks, purposely ignoring her friend’s advice.
“Nothing I can’t handle,” Olivia replies, already putting her phone back. “Also, nice try but I know you heard me. You might think you’re not looking for someone like her but I know you, Cat. I’ve known you for a long time and despite the fact we didn’t talk for many years, I can still read you pretty well.”
Olivia stands up and grabs her glass, finishing it bottoms up. She then moves to retrieve her jacket, pulling it on and adjusting it before turning back to face Cat.
“Call her, Cat,” Olivia says, flattening the lapels of her jacket. “Do something, otherwise you’ll live with “what if” and “maybe” and I remember how you hate it. Be a big girl and follow your own advice : in order to survive, we must keep daring …”
“Diving,” Cat corrects, despite the fact she did use the word daring as well.
“I mean, that too but what you do in bed is your business,” Olivia smirks and Cat gasps before laughing out loud.
She didn’t see this coming but then again, Olivia Marsden had always been full of surprises, from the pot brownies she used to cook in college to the fact she was an alien.
“Seriously though, give it a try. What’s the worst that can happen?” Olivia asks, the malicious gleam in her eyes having been replaced with something far more serious.
Cat doesn’t answer the question and Olivia seems to know that this time, she shouldn’t insist.
“Anyway, I have to go Cat,” Olivia says, already walking toward the entrance door. Cat stands up and follows after her friend to make sure the bodyguards at her door will safely take her back to the car.
“I will see you tomorrow at the office, probably first thing in the morning since Russell asked for a meeting about you going through so many assistants in so little time …”
“Eh, let him barks, it’ll keep him busy while I find someone myself,” Cat chuckles, moving to drop a kiss on her friend’s cheek.
“Call her,” Olivia says again before exiting the loft, the door closing behind her after those last words.
---
“I hear you’re having trouble finding a decent assistant these days …”
Cat smiles around the rim of her glass and looks up to the night sky.
Supergirl’s floating a few inches up, her cape fluttering softly in the quietness of the night and her golden hair flowing freely around her delicate and otherworldly features. The moon at her back gives her silhouette a pale, silver glow that truly makes her look like a goddess from another universe, a mythical creature.
“Good evening, Supergirl,” Cat greets her, raising her glass in a mock-toast. “Care to explain why you conveniently show up on my balcony minutes after I sent a text to my former assistant?”
Supergirl floats down a few inches, half of her body disappearing behind the ledge of Cat’s balcony until their eyes are approximately at the same level. The light that spills out from Cat’s bedroom enlights Kara’s small smile and makes her eyes shine ever so dimly.
“I could spring some lie on you, say that Kara told me that you texted and that it made me want to check on you myself but what would be the point?” Kara asks, her voice soft and quiet but still clear, carrying into the night. “We both know you were never fooled, not even that time you saw Supergirl and Kara Danvers at the same time in your office.”
“To be fair, I never truly understood how you managed such an exploit,” Cat nods and takes another sip of her drink. “Anyway, no you never fooled me. How could you, with the way you were always darting out of the room with the flimsiest excuse, every of those times coincidentally happening whenever Supergirl’s presence was required? It’s like you forgot that I am a journalist, before and above anything else.”
For a moment, Supergirl looks almost outraged, but then she laughs and the sound echoes into the night like a sweet melody.
“That’s fair, I was never good at lying, despite the whole other identity situation …”
“Would you tell me?” Cat asks, searching into Kara’s eyes. “You real identity, I mean …”
Kara looks a little hesitant for a few seconds but then, she flies up and closer.
Her boots softly land on the balcony floor, and she stands up in front of Cat, a hand resting on the symbol on her chest.
“My name is Kara Zor-El,” Kara says, reverence lining her voice.
Cat notices the way Supergirl stands, tall and proud, with her chin up and steel in her jaw. She’s royalty, framed by the stars twinkling behind her golden mane and the moon hanging high above her head.
“I’m sorry it took me so long to finally tell you, but I wanted to protect you, back then.”
Cat doesn’t say anything.
She’s been abducted by the Silver Banshee and Leslie Willis once, so she knows the risk of being tied to Supergirl. She can understand why Kara never told her about her alter-ego. It still stings a little but she understands anyway.
“Why now?” Cat eventually asks, looking up to meet Kara’s eyes.
Kara seems to hesitate for a moment, suddenly looking thoughtful and distant at once.
“Someone very dear to me once told me to put on my big-girl pants and to own up to my power …” Kara eventually whispers. “I think it’s time I finally followed that advice but that’s not all. See … my sister also got good advice from someone dear to her. Someone who told her that life is short, and she should kiss the people she wants to kiss.”
Cat’s heart misses a beat when Kara takes a step forward. The smell of wind and flowers overload her senses, and she almost forgets to breathe, drowning in Kara’s presence.
“That’s … good advice indeed,” Cat whispers, getting lost in the baby blue of Kara’s eyes.
“I thought so,” Kara smiles and then adds “I really, really, really want to kiss you now, Miss Grant.”
Cat can feel her heart go wild in her chest, beating frantically against her rib cage, drumming in her ears and pulsing in her temples. She’s been hoping for this moment for so long she can’t wrap her head around the fact it’s about to happen.
“Then … what are you waiting for, Kara?” Cat whispers, slowly enunciating the right name.
It’s all it takes.
The kiss is mind-blowing, full of all the pent-up frustration they’ve been suffering through for years. It’s deep and a little blunt, with Kara’s playful tongue exploring the inside of Cat’s mouth and hands roaming along the flexed muscles stretched underneath the superhero suit. It lasts and lasts and at some point, Cat eventually feels the need to come back up for some air.
She pulls away, one hand tangled in Kara’s hair and the other clutched around the rim of Kara’s cape. Their breath come out ragged and irregular but Kara’s smile is blinding, full of joy and hope.
“Damn,” Cat whispers, a little dazzled.
“Speechless is a good look on you, Miss Grant,” Kara teases, dropping a kiss at the corner of Cat’s lips.
“Cat. Please, call me Cat,” Cat says, looking up into Kara’s eyes. “Beside, don’t get too smug, it will take a lot more than just a kiss to render me unable to speak.”
“Is that a challenge, Cat?” Kara asks, tilting her head to the side as interest sparkles in her eyes. The way she pronounces Cat’s name sounds like a secret and a promise at once, it makes Cat tingle.
“Only one way to find out,” Cat offers, stepping backward to her bedroom.
She lets a hand slide along Kara’s arm, until it reaches her hand. Their fingers instinctively intertwine and Kara instantly follows, her smile full of wonder and her eyes as bright as the thousand stars shining in the sky behind her.