Work Text:
To say Alex was having a bad day was putting it about as mildly as possible.
Reasons why Alex’s day was going badly:
- Maggie was out of town for the week visiting some friends from Gotham.
- She had started her day off by finding out the power to her entire city block was knocked out due to a random blizzard that had swept through the city overnight.
- A blizzard had swept through the city overnight… In the middle of June…
- She was late to work because the roads weren’t cleared yet.
- Upon arriving at work she found out the blizzard was caused by a rogue alien who was trying to forcibly change the Earth’s climate to match their home planet, which was regularly over a hundred degrees colder than Earth.
- Maggie was out of town.
- She had to lead a team to lead with the alien they knew practically nothing about.
- She was frozen in a block of ice because (surprise!) the alien had serious frost breath and the only reason she wasn’t permanently turned into an Alex-sicle was because her little sister had heat vision. (And the alien escaped… Yippee…)
- She had to spend several hours in the DEO infirmary after the whole being frozen thing.
- That whole being frozen thing had seriously messed with her muscles and had left her whole body beyond sore.
- She was confined to bed for at least 24 hours.
- Maggie wasn't due back in town for at least three more days.
Alex groaned as she tried (and failed) to roll over in bed and instead found herself staring up at the ceiling, giving in to her predicament for the time being. She’s starting to regret not having Kara leave her on the couch… Or taking her sister up on her offer to stay over (even though she knew they needed her to help catch the alien).
Alex had almost managed to drift off to bed after what felt like hours of just her eyes tracing over the random patterns on the ceiling when she heard the front door open with a high pitched squeal.
“Look buddy, I’m gonna give you one chance to turn around and walk out of here, I’m a trained federal agent and I’m most certainly armed at the moment.” Alex called out, her voice groggier than she’d have liked, hoping that whoever it was would heed her warning and leave so she wouldn’t have to try to move. Instead there was a chuckle and the sounds of someone moving farther into the apartment.
“According to your sister you can barely move right now so I think I’m safe.” Alex’s eyes widened and she attempted to shoot up in bed but was once again thwarted by her aching muscles. “Just stay there, I’ll be over in a second, just let me change.”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to be back until Friday?” Alex murmured just loud enough for the other woman to hear her, not really caring anymore if her voice sounded okay since she didn’t need to intimidate potential thieves in her state of semi-paralysis anymore. There’s a dip in the bed to her right and she feels a pair of arms snake their way around her waist and gently pull her up against her girlfriend's body.
“Kara called, she told me what happened since she didn’t think you’d be in any condition to try to call and I asked her to come get me.” Maggie suddenly appeared in her field of vision, smiling down at her gently before moving to pepper soft kisses all across her face.
“But you were busy with your friends…” Maggie cut her off with a soft peck to her lips.
“Yeah, and now I’m busy taking care of my girl, my friends can deal with it… Now…” Maggie sat up next to her, “I brought some food…”
“Food…” Maggie chuckled as Alex’s stomach grumbled, the younger woman not realizing that she was, in fact, hungry until Maggie said something.
“Yes, baby, lots of food. But we need to have you sitting up in order to eat anything, think you can so that?” Maggie threaded her fingers through Alex’s hair and gently scratched at her scalp, something Alex was pretty sure the other woman had figured out had a calming effect on her, and she appreciated the effort.
“I probably can with some help, but there’s no way I can pick up any silverware, I couldn’t even pick up my charts earlier, Kara had to hold them for me…” Alex trailed off uncertainly but Maggie just hummed in response and moved to help Alex sit up.
Actually getting Alex up was a bit of a hassle, not because Alex didn’t really want to get up and eat, but because her body seemed to think it was a great time to start randomly spasming every time they tried to move her. After about twenty minutes, however, they had managed to get her seated upright and Maggie had wandered back to the living room area to pick up her food where she’d left it when she got there.
Alex had never really let people stick around when she was sick or injured in the past, normally it was the kind of thing she preferred to handle on her own if she dealt with it at all. Has the flu? Goes to work and doesn’t leave until J’onn threatens her with mandatory sick leave. Has a concussion? Still in the lab the next day running tests on whoever the villain of the week is. Three cracked ribs and a broken arm? You bet she was there for training everyday and got mad that no one took fighting her seriously. And then (like most things in her life) there was Maggie.
Maggie, who just about tore Alex’s arm off dragging her back to bed the first time she tried to sneak into the DEO when she was sick. Maggie, who had stayed up with her all night when she had a concussion and proceeded to take the week off in order to take care of her admittedly very stubborn girlfriend. Maggie, who personally ensured that when Alex broke her leg that she wasn’t able to go near the training rooms at work and that she was locked up in her labs the whole time working on the science aspect of her job.
Maggie who was going to have to feed her because her fingers can’t seem to pick anything up without automatically dropping it again. Something that, if Maggie were anyone else, Alex would protest vehemently against the very idea of. She wasn’t even a fan of the whole sharing food like that when she was fully functioning, much less when it was out of necessity.
But there she was, sitting in bed having Maggie feed her some fried rice from their favorite Chinese restaurant while the older detective went on about her trip and how she’d somehow gotten roped into helping talk down a hostage situation on her vacation. And despite the fact she normally would feel very uncomfortable with the situation, she was surprisingly content, sitting in bed with her girlfriend being fed while talking about their days.
And later that night, when Maggie was tucked securely into her side and snoring softly in her ear, she realized, for the first time. The intimacy doesn’t just include having sex, but all of the other little things in between.