2015-07-20 - The Morning After

Memories for Leah today were a hazy, indistinct thing. For example, last night, Leah and her friends, Jennifer and Stephanie, had watched Kara handle some guy who was getting too aggressive with Jennifer, then tried to grab Leah. It resulted in him running out of there when Kara got involved. Then they finished their daquiris, then there was some talk about getting Kara hammered in celebration, which led to screwdrivers, then boilermakers, then long island iced teas... then there's pretty much a jumbled mess of questions.

Such as, why was Leah flopped face down on a really nice semi-circle microfiber soft leather couch. Or why was there a bucket placed by the aforementioned couch. Or why was there a little man in Leah's head that was using a sledgehammer on the insides of her eyes and ears when she heard Kara's voice say, "Oh good, you're awake." in a cheerful voice. Or why does that man in her head decide that a sledgehammer isnt enough and he starts using a jackhammer instead when the blender is turned on? And why was the sun in the window so bright, or why was the room a little wobbly?

Kara heads into the living room with a little glass of -something- that she made in the blender.

In Leah's opinion, blenders are actually the spawn of a satanist and a DMV employee, at this point in time anyway. Craking an eye barely enough to allow her to verify that she's not actually in hell, she chooses not to raise her head so as to deny the little guy an expansion on the house he's trying to build. No reason he should have a better day than she's having.

"Make the room stop ...doing things." She sounds like she's been better. And she looks at Kara with a hint of venom in her expression. "And why do you look alive?"

Kara Zor-El sits on the edge of the couch near Leah, offering her the drink with a happy little smile. Clearly there are no evil men trying to impale her head from the inside with blunt-ended needles. "Um.... because I don't get hangovers. At least not from anything on this planet. Here... drink this. I looked it up on the internet. It's supposed to help." She sniffs it once, and scrunches her nose with distaste, before again handing it to you. "Or ... I don't know.... something. Don't ask what's in it." She shrugs with that same smile. Yeesh. She's way too happy when the sun is just so annoyingly bright and the air's so airy. Ugh. "I put Jennifer and Stephanie in a cab last night, but I figured you might be better off coming back here."

Kara slides down onto the main part of the couch, taking out her phone. "I took videos of last night." she says, trying to hold in the giggle."

Leah looks at the drink, uncertain if she's supposed to drink it or have it quarantined. She actually has a hazmat team on her speed-dial so the option is there, but in this case...she tips herself upright with a groan and eyes Kara, then the drink, and opens her mouth to ask what's in it.

Being told that there's videos makes her blink, which was probably a mistake as well. "Should be scared of that, but I think my sense of fear is in my other pants." So she sips the drink, eyeing the phone. Then the cup. Taking a second thought about that hazmat team. "Buwhah?"

Whatever's in there really does taste awful. "Just gulp it down, that's what the internet says to do with it." Then she gives Leah a reassuring hug. "Here... I hooked up the output of the phone on my TV. I think it deserves the big screen."

She presses a few buttons on the phone after turning the TV on with the remote, and the first of many videos to come is shown. Apparently it's of Kara and Leah, with Kara saying, "Yeah um... you just push that button and it gives the video function."

---

Stephanie's voice, obviously the one using the phone, says, "What brand is this anyway?"

Kara: "Oh um.... I made it."

"Wait you -made- a phone? Leah, your girl here does kung fu, looks like that, and builds phones in her spare time? Yeah we definitely need to get her drunk."

The phone falls on the floor. Jennifer: "CRAP! Crap is it okay?"

Kara: "Yeah it should be fine. It's really sturdy. I built it that way."

---

A new video:

Stephanie and Kara and Jennifer are taking a shot of something. "Okay now on three we just down it. One, two.... DOWN IT!" And they all throw back the show of the amber-looking liquid, turn the glass over, and put it on the table upside down. As well as the next 4 shots.

The video gets a little shaky, and Leah's voice can be heard, "Actually Kara maybe you should hold the phone before I do some serious damage to it." AT which point the phone changes hands to Kara and there's a video of Leah, Stephanie, and Jennifer. And on the table there seems to be a little army of shotglasses and larger glasses. Jennifer peers at the person holding the phone now - Kara. "Seriously, not even buzzed?" she asks. The phone seems to shake its head no. Then Kara's finger and thumb are in the image, touching. "Maybe a teensy bit?" Kara lies.

Jennifer, of the three of them, looks the most wasted at this point, and she says, "You know.... when you caught that guy's fist?"

Silence.

Jennifer: "Yknow that right?"

Kara's voice: "Yeah... I was there when it happened." She seems happy and not at all drunk.

Jennifer: "Yknow it though right?"

Kara's voice. "Yeaaaaah?"

Jennifer leans forward, "That was so cool." she says with a giggle.

Leah seems to be second on the 'most drunk' list. "Oooh, hey..... I have an idea! Gimme the camera thingy... phone... thingy. No wait givit to jennifer"

She whispers something to Jennifer, who squeals in delight.

The phone changes hands to Jennifer, who apparently videos as Leah takes Kara by the hand and leads her over to some big brawny guy, with Leah basically hanging onto Kara as well. "I'mma gonna get you on a date, cause you're so pretty and you should go on dates." She then pokes the brawny guy. "You think she's cute right?"

Leah's hand smooshes Kara's cheeks and the video pans to Kara's bewildered face. "So cuuuute." Stephanie's voice says. "You should ask her on a date, but don't try to get fresh cause she could kick your butt." Stephanie says, poking the similarly bewildered looking brawny guy.

Kara's voice: "Sorry mister, my friends are a little tipsy. Plus I have a boyfriend"

The man: "Yeaaaah.... I sorta figgered on both counts. No problem."

There's then some jostling of the camera, breaking to the next video. At which point you see Leah standing on a table with a tablecloth tied to her neck like a cape. "Howz I look!?" Apparently Stephanie's holding the camera now, because you can see Jennifer putting shotglasses up to her eyes, saying, "Whaddya think the best superpower would be if we were superheroes for reals?" Kara's holding her hands over her face as Leah points out, "This looks like a job for..."


 * Crash* as she falls off the table, caught by Kara.

Cut to next video.

---

Leah slugs the drink at some point during the second or third video, barely noticing the fact that it burns out half her tastebuds and at least two of her college courses. Priorities. Besides, she thought she'd lost those courses ages ago during her graduation afterparty.

"Wouldn't have thought it, but somehow you're making my hangover even more ..." and she pauses, looking at Kara's smiling face, and wonders if it's worth ruining the girl's fun. "More ...interesting...I was totally going to make it out the window on my next try, though. Irish superpowers."

She winces inwardly and waits for the next one.

Next video is with Jennifer by the jukebox at the bar. "OOOH THIS ONE!" Then she runs back to grab Stephanie and Leah, while Kara's apparently the one with the camera now. "Karaoke! Karaoke!"

---

Kara's voice: "I don't think that's how Karaoke works..." she says as the three start singing "Stronger" by Kelly Clarkson. Or at least it would be if they werent making up words aside from the main verse. Then Leah grabs Kara's arm and tries pulling her up with her.

Kara's voice: "I don't know the words!"

Leah: "Just listen to us and those are the words."

Kara's voice: "I don't really think they are?"

The phone is then video-ing the bar ceiling for a good minute or so with more singing, followed by crashing, followed by laughing.

Jennifer: "what doesnt kiss you makes you stronger!"

Kara's voice: "I really really don't think thes are the words."

The phone is taken by Jennifer, who's video'ing everything at a diagonal angle now, and Leah gives Kara a kiss on the cheek while Stephanie says, "How doooo you.... um.... you know with the drinking when you're built like... that pixie with peter pan?

Jennifer's voice: "Tinkerbell!"

Stephanie: "No, the pixie!"

Jennifer's voice: "That's her name! Tinkerbell!"

Stephanie: "No no the other pixie! The one who's all blonde haired and has a teensy little waist?" A hand, who's owner is off-camera (Stephanie), points at Kara's waist.

Leah leans on Kara, while Kara is just looking around, saying, "I don't even know who Peter Pan...."

Leah then shouts right in Kara's ear, "I know! Tinkerbell!" she yells, pointing at Stephanie.

Stephanie nods! "Yeah that's the one!"

Then she falls on her butt again.

Break to yet another video of the phone looking at Kara, held by Leah. "We're like bessssht friendsh!" Kara is just looking at the camera, trying to not giggle. "Yeah." Her face is really trying to keep that smile from turning into laughing. "You should smiles a lot mores... Kara."

Leah's hand starts getting put on Kara's face, mainly on her nose and part of her cheek. "You're too worried looking all the time. Keep shmilin.... wait I know. Superstrength, I'd definiely want superst... wait ... JEnnifer? If we were superheroes, I'd..."

Jennifer's sleeping with her head on the table.

Stephanie's sitting on the lap of the brawny man who looks around, with his boyfriend sitting next to him looking amused. Stephanie gives him a kiss on the cheek, then rests her head on his shoulder, and she's half-asleep too.

End of video.

---

Kara Zor-El looks at Leah with a grin on her face. "Anyway, I paid the bill, apologized to Ray, that's the guy's name, put Stephanie and Jennifer in a cab and gave the cab driver an extra 40 if he'd help them to their doors, then took you back here. I'd have taken all three of you home but I don't think any of you were in a position to fly." She grins and puts her hand on Leah's cheeks, squooshing them a bit, saying "My best fwiend"

Leah is staring at Kara in a half-glazed state as she tries to process everything she just saw. Still being badly hung over isn't helping, though she's been in that state enough that she's actually able to function. Ask about her sweet sixteen family holocaust someday.

She smiles a little bit, not completely certain that Kara's 'hangover cure' drink is going to stay down, and puts her hands on Kara's on her cheeks. Then she says, "Kara, if that gets out onto the internet I will have to kill you. Slowly. Regretfully, but you will have to die." She doesn't mention that the primary regret will be because moving is making her joints ache, but proper friendship will have to wait for after she's had coffee.

"Oh, an' thank you for...not letting anyone drive. Even though we were just planning on having daquiris..." She isn't sure how it became anything else. But hey...drunk logic.

Kara Zor-El smiles, unsquooshing Leah's cheeks and just holding Leah's hand. "I know. It won't. You all tried daquiris and when that didn't work Jennifer kept insisting on something stronger." She leans forward. "Want me to make breakfast or something? You need some solid food after last night, and I have a friend who's been making my patrols a little less 24 hour..."

Leah leans back on the couch, letting her body tell her that she's dumb. Gee thanks, never would have figured that one out. "Only if you turn down the lights," she says, regardless of the fact that the lights ARE turned down. And watching videos on a lit television have a lovely stabby thing going on in her brain again.

And, out of years of long practice, she says, "After a night of heavy drinking, the body needs...recover lost sodium...mumblemumble.." as if she's reciting something. Which she is; a card she wrote and memorized for this situation. "Whole grain toast...grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, orange...hyurrkkk..."

The last part isn't really a word exactly. It's kind of what it sounds like when a sick nurse leans over the bucket by her couch and allows the hangover cure from earlier to make a second appearance. With spirit!

Kara Zor-El jumps over the couch to go into the kitchen, "One breakfast coming up!"

Poor choice of words as she turns and scrunches her nose and makes a little face. "I am so glad I put that bucket there...." she says to herself.

Leah wonders if she's ever going to develop that superpower that allows her to not be a sicky after a night of her father's normal nights at the pub. She wipes her face, looking like she's lost her puppy that she totally doesn't have but that's not the point. Then she gets up to go use the washroom. For a few reasons. All the while making noises about SOME people and their not having hangovers and no I don't believe you do just a little young lady. But she is grinning, just a teensy bit.

Shortly afterward, having gotten rid of the worst of the barf breath with her mouthwash and a toothbrush, Leah comes out of the washroom. She watches Kara carefully and with actual love grill her some tomatoes and mushrooms, and stolidly ignores the protests her stomach makes. Shut up, it's for your own good. Noooo, you can't make me! Yes I can, you'll die however I command, bitch. You aren't my mother!

....anyway, back to what Kara can see and out of Leah's strange brain.

Watching Kara, Leah leans on the door frame a moment as the Kryptonian hums and actually crushes oranges for orange juice. With her hands. Easily. And suddenly Kara finds two gentle, warm arms slipping around her waist from behind as Leah gives her the hug she deserves. And four words, for beautiful words, whispered into her ear.

"My best friend too."