Disclaimer: I do not own The Flash or anything to do with DC. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.
*****
"Nervous?"
The words startled Iris West out of her thoughts, causing her to jump a little and rapidly blink. Once she was properly out of her own head Iris focused on the beautiful woman in front of her, and the smirk on her face which caused a little tingle of fear and excitement to rush through her body.
Fear because Caitlin Snow truly looked like her Earth 2 doppelgänger Killer Frost in that moment, and excitement because she knew she had nothing to fear from the other woman, and Caitlin was merely looking at her endearingly, which was a welcome addition to what had once been a platonic friendship.
"No." Iris lied, and then added, "No, I just... it's been a long day."
"Tell me about it." Caitlin sighed, "This whole being a hero thing is hard."
"But you're so good at it." Iris insisted, "No way Barry could have succeeded without you."
"I doubt that. But it was nice to help." Caitlin admitted, the two friends turned lovers sharing a smile before the white-haired girl leaned in and added, "And for the record... I'm nervous. This is kind of a big deal, you know?"
"I know." Iris agreed softly.
It really was, considering this was their first official date. Or at least the first official date in public. They'd spent the last two weeks hanging out in each other's apartments, watching movies and mostly eating take-out whenever they weren't working.
Or having sex. And it was pretty obvious they were both nervous, but Iris wanted to do her best to hide it as she knew Caitlin was self-conscious enough about her new look, many of the people at the restaurant quitely leaving when they arrive as it was obvious from her incredibly pale skin, and the way she instantly froze a few drinks, Caitlin was a Meta-human.
Deciding it might be better to come clean Iris admitted, "I'm nervous too, but I'm also excited. It's not every day I get to have a first time, and my first date with another girl is pretty special. And it's even better than I could imagine because it's with you."
Caitlin smiled and then took Iris's hand, "I feel the same way."
Iris smiled back and squeezed Caitlin's hand. Then the two of them just stared at each other from across the table while holding hands for a few long seconds, the two women just enjoying each other's company.
Then their waiter came and after blushing slightly and turning their attention to their menus they ordered and then started making small talk, mostly about Iris's work at the paper. Iris gave Caitlin plenty of opportunity to talk about herself, but she always deflected, which didn't bode well.
Iris knew Caitlin had been struggling to adapt to her new body, and that the other girl didn't like to talk about it, especially now they were officially dating.
As worrying as that was the fact that she deflected a conversation about her work suggested Caitlin hadn't made much progress on their latest 'big bad' or the attempts to turn herself back into her 'normal' form, and while Iris maintained that Caitlin's 'Killer Frost' form was awesome and allowed her to do a lot of good selfishly Iris wanted to be able to kiss her girlfriend. But there was something else, the reporter in her telling Iris that Caitlin was holding back something from her.
There was indeed something on Caitlin's mind, and shortly after their meal arrived, she blurted out, "So... have you told anyone about... you know, us?"
"No." Iris frowned, "Why? Has someone said anything?"
"No. Not... not exactly." Caitlin said, before admitting, "It's I just a kind of had a weird conversation with your Dad, and I kind of got the impression that he knows."
"Well he is a detective. I would be disappointed if he couldn't figure it out." Iris grinned, before quickly adding, "Wait, just how weird was this conversation?"
"Oh... you know, just..." Caitlin stalled for time, again debating what to say, before opting for the truth, "He asked me if you were seeing anyone, and I basically said it was up to you to tell him. Then he smiled and reminded me he taught you how to shoot."
"Yeah, he knows." Iris smirked after a brief pause, and then when Caitlin groaned she added, "What? That was just him playing the Dad card. All of my previous boyfriends basically got the same speech, and they weren't superheroes."
"I'm... I'm not..." Caitlin stammered, not really wanting to have this conversation again. Then she latched onto another part of Iris's words, "Wait, so I'm your boyfriend now? Erm, girlfriend?"
Suddenly very aware they hadn't officially had that conversation yet Iris bit her lip and said, "Well, we should probably go on a few more dates before using the word out loud, but yeah. Basically. Unless you want to avoid labels or something, in which case I don't mind."
"I'm okay with labels." Caitlin said quickly, "Or at least that one."
The two girls smiled softly at each other, gently reached for the other's hand and then Iris said, "Good."
Then Caitlin asked, "So, do you think your Dad will kill me?"
"No." Iris laughed, took her hand back, and then when she saw Caitlin was serious added, "No, he loves you. Not like I do, but whenever we've talked about you in the past he's always had nice things to say about you."
"Oh, so only he had good things to say?" Caitlin teased.
"Pretty much." Iris teased back, giving Caitlin a fond smile.
After returning that smile Caitlin asked, "So, who else do you think really knows?"
Iris thought for a minute, and then said, "Maybe the Wellses, although Harry probably wouldn't care, and Jesse is probably either waiting for us to come out to say anything, or... distracted."
Caitlin frowned, "Distracted?"
"What, you have a notice what's going with her and my baby brother?" Iris murmured.
"Wally?" Caitlin softly exclaimed with genuine surprise, "Huh... isn't she a bit young for him?"
"Not really." Iris shrugged, "It's easy to forget but Wally is closer to Jesse's age then ours."
"I guess you're right." Caitlin said.
"You really had no idea?" Iris pushed after a couple of seconds of silence, "They've been super obvious."
"Well, I've been a little preoccupied." Caitlin said coldly.
"Of course you have..." Iris said softly, quickly searching for something to defuse the tension that was now between them. Luckily she found one, "And hey, I can guarantee Wally has no clue about us."
This succeeded in making Caitlin smile, and then as soon as possible she asked, "What about Barry?"
There was maybe a second or two of silence, and then both women burst out laughing at the idea that Barry Alan would be able to pick up on the change between them.
True, Caitlin hadn't known him that long, but Iris assured her that he had never been good with subtlety and had always been adorably clueless about when it came to people's feelings.
After all, he hadn't realised that both of them at one point would have said yes if he had the nerve to ask them out, and had even considered doing it themselves. Although they were glad they hadn't, as they might not be here otherwise.
The night then went on like that for sometime, the two girls swapping stories, making each other laugh, and generally enjoying the meal, and most importantly each other's company.
It meant so much to Caitlin, because maybe for the first time since going through her transformation she felt normal again Well, maybe she had felt kind of normal on the unofficial dates she'd had with Iris, and all those times they had sex, but this was different.
This was public. In the real world where anyone could see, making this thing between them much more real. The only problem was that for most of the meal they could have been mistaken as just friends, and there was a part of Caitlin which longed for that simplicity. At least until she walked Iris to her door. Then friends was the last thing she wanted.
"So here we are." Caitlin mumbled when they arrived.
"Here we are." Iris nodded in agreement.
There was a brief silence between them and then Caitlin admitted, "You know, the old me would have never had sex on the first date. Not even if I had slept with the guy previously. And the whole sleeping with someone first happen once, and that was with Ronnie, and... I don't know. I guess I was just a traditional girl at heart."
"Hey." Iris said softly, stepping closer, "You can still be a traditional girl if you want. I don't mind. I keep telling you, just because you're different doesn't mean you're different. We can wait as long as you want."
