You are the fire (I'm your gasoline)

Chapter 4

Lena doesn't go to Midvale that summer. None of the Luthors do. Lex is too busy with LuthorCorp, Lillian decides to spend her time across the world visiting a friend, and Lena attends summer school in California for the better part of her break in order to graduate high school early after next semester.

Instead, when Lena's back, Kara comes up to Metropolis for a week. She stays with Clark in his apartment, and during the day Lena drives downtown to hang out with her. The thought of having Kara over at the Luthor Mansion instead crossed her mind, but for some reason it didn't feel right. While the place used to feel like home, now it just reminds Lena of her father. And, even when she's not physically there, Lillian's cold-heartedness seems to have left a permanent imprint on the house. Lena doesn't want to bring Kara into that.

Clark is dating a woman named Lois now, and one night when he kicks Kara and Lena out of the apartment, Lena quite literally drags a protesting Kara out the door. She thinks that technically Kara could put her foot down and become impossible to move anywhere, but Lena manages to pull her into her car before Kara turns to look at her with her eyebrows raised.

"What was that for?"

"Lois is coming over," Lena says, and when Kara still looks confused, she rolls her eyes. "They're dating. She's coming over."

Kara blinks. "So? That doesn't mean we can't be there, too."

Lena stares at Kara long enough to feel like her eyes are going to dry up, before giving up hope that Kara will ever understand. "They're going to have sex, Kara."

"Oh," Kara says, covering her face with her hands. "Oh my gosh, yes, we definitely don't wanna be there for that."

Lena laughs, putting her car in drive. She's not sure where they're going, but she figures that now that Kara knows what's going to happen upstairs, she might not want to hang around for it.

They drive around for a while, Lena honking and cursing at everyone cutting her off to stay in their lane. It seems to amuse Kara a little, and eventually her shoulders relax, and she leans her head against the door to look out the window.

A silence falls over them, the only source of sound being Lena's car radio, and Lena glances at Kara. "Hey, what are you thinking about?"

Kara doesn't reply for a while, and then she takes a deep breath. "Just trying to look at the stars. They're not very clear in the city."

Lena pulls up for a red light, and she takes the moment to look over at Kara—really look. Something about the stars reminds Kara of her parents, Lena knows this, and suddenly she knows exactly where they should go. When the light turns green, she takes a sharp turn, which makes Kara squeal in surprise.

"Where are we going?"

"You'll see," Lena says. "First we're getting food, though. I'm starving. Pizza?"

Kara nods, a curious smile tugging at her lips. "Pizza sounds great."

Lena drives them to the nearest pizza place, where they get two large pizzas, and while they're both munching down on a slice, she steers the car towards the outskirts of Metropolis. She stares down the street she'd normally take to go back home, driving right past it to take another exit.

After another ten minutes of driving, they cross from the city center to the suburbs, and quite suddenly all the lights are gone and they're mostly surrounded by darkness. From the corner of her eye, Lena notices Kara leaning closer to the window.

And, surely enough, there's a twinkling sky stretched in front of them. But there's still some light pollution from the houses and street lights, so Lena keeps driving until they pass the city limit. She pulls up on a hill just outside of town, from where they can see both the city lights down below and the bright stars shining down on them.