Erica Sullivan Just Got Silver In The 1500m (and Only Behind Katie Ledecky) And Her Twitter Account Is

the parallels

“I’m home.”

A college au where Lena does the unthinkable: she forgets about her chemistry lab. Now Lena never misses a lab. She’s never even late to class. So when her lab partner calls her, asking where she is, her heart drops. She’d forgotten it’s Wednesday. How could she forget it’s Wednesday?

A glance at her watch tells her that she has approximately 10 minutes before she’s actually late, which is plenty of time to get two buildings over to the lab space.

The only minor snag is, well… lab dress code. Normally, that would never be an issue. She always keeps a spare pair of safety goggles in her bag, and she’d never deign to wear something like shorts or sandals to attend classes, like some of her peers.

But… some days, she’s just stayed up far too late studying. Some days, she’s barely staying upright by coffee and willpower alone, and she’s so tired that she couldn’t even be bothered to put her contacts in before classes. On those days, she’s willing to make a minor exception to her usually immaculate state of dress.

With her biomedical engineering midterm fast approaching, today happens to be one of those days. The skin tight leggings that she threw on before sleepily rushing out the door that morning mock her with the way that they cling. Honestly it’s not as if she planned to spill corrosives on herself, but she knows for a fact Dr. Kord wouldn’t allow her to walk through the door in such “lab inappropriate apparel.”

Ugh. At least, the tennis shoes she threw on are close-toed. She’ll figure something out.

And as she scurries through the chemistry halls towards the lab, that something presents itself.

She catches site of a blond girl in comfy looking NCU sweat pants heading into the restroom just around the corner from her destination. And really, she can’t believe she’s doing this, but her options are limited. So she looks the girl dead in the eye through the mirror and steels herself, as she firmly states, “I need your pants.”

“You… what?” her bewilderment is evident in her reflection.

“Your pants. I need them,” Lena repeats to the stranger, raising her chin, as if this isn’t the strangest request (read: demand) she’s ever made.

The blond turns around to face her, spluttering as she pulls at the straps of her backpack. She eyes the door behind Lena momentarily, before asking, “Why?”

Lena sighs, “Chemistry lab,” and glances down at her watch, a frown growing. “In two and a half minutes. And I… well…” She gestures down at her legs, sheepishly. “I forgot.”

Her eyes lock again with the blond’s and she momentarily forgets her fluster in realization that, behind dark-framed glasses, they’re a vibrant shade of blue. And determined, too.

Determined enough to usher Lena into a stall, and without a word, she heads into the adjacent one. A pair of sweats are flopped over the dividing wall for Lena to grab, and as she strips off her leggings to pull on the sweat pants, she notices the name ‘Danvers’ running down the thigh. It seems oddly familiar, but—

“So how long is this lab?” the girl in the next stall asks.

“Four hours.” The splutter from next door tells Lena that maybe this ‘Danvers’ didn’t necessarily think this through.

“Four hours?! Am I supposed to just… hang out here, pants-less, that whole time?”

And, oh, that finally breaks through Lena’s stress and embarrassment. “Of course not.” Laughing, she tosses her leggings over wall, and exits her stall to the sound of shuffling.

“Thanks for this, by the way,” Lena says as she digs for her goggles in her bag. “I really owe you.”

“It’s no problem,” the voice behind her says as the stall door swings open. “It may be one of the weirder things to happen to me, but definitely not the weirdest.”

Lena goes to laugh at that, but the sound dies in her throat and her mouth goes dry as she takes in the reflection of incredibly fit and well-muscled legs shifting under the tight material of her leggings. She has to swallow a deep breath and blink hard to recalibrate her mind.

But the girl immediately decimates the progress by twisting to get a view of her ass in the tight spandex, giving Lena a rather favorable view in the process.

“Don’t look too terrible, do they?” she asks with a grin.

“No.” Lena’s voice comes out strangled, and she looks away, clearing her throat before trying again. “No, definitely not.”

Looking for anywhere to place her eyes that isn’t on her savior’s well-defined (and now prominently-displayed) ass, Lena glances at her watch again.

Fuck.

“I should—“ Lena starts, gesturing to the door.

“Yeah,” the girl agrees, shuffling her feet and scratching at the back of her neck. And was that a faint blush Lena spied on her cheeks?

“I’ll, uh, get these back to—“

“No worries. Go, we’ll figure something—“

“—Yeah.”

They both pause, just gazing at each other for a moment, when Lena’s phone rings.

“Lena, where are you?!” a voice calls from the phone speaker.

Lena flashes the blond a last smile and a little wave, as she says, “I’m just around the corner, Jack. I’ll be right—“

She runs straight into her lab partner, who steadies her as she stumbles. “—there.”

“Thank god. You made it. I was worried I’d have to pair up with that moronic—“ Jack’s voice trailed off as he stared at her, mouth agape. “Are you… Why are you wearing Kara’s sweats?”

“Who?” Lena’s brows furrow.

“Kara. Kara Danvers. NCU’s star soccer player? She as in that game Sam dragged us to.” A smug grin spreads across Jack’s face. “I knew it! I knew you were lusting over her! You spent the whole time staring.”

Danvers. That’s why the name sounded familiar. And, now that she thought about it, the face too, though she hadn’t worn those glasses that hid half her face during the game.

“God, I can’t believe you’re sleeping with Kara Danvers. I can’t wait to tell Sam.” Jack sounded far too gleeful about the whole situation.

“We’re— I’m… I’m not— We’re not—“ Lena struggles to get any words out to explain the situation. But images of the blond… Kara… in her leggings spring to life in her mind, and Lena quickly realizes she wouldn’t be opposed to it being true.

“Lena. Darling. You got in her pants. Literally.” Jack smirks, and a blushing Lena just shoves him towards the door.

“Just get in the fucking lab.”

my dad likes to call the stretches of time where you’re not creating “dreaming periods” and says that they’re meant to allow you to absorb all of the beauty, life, and inspiration from the things around you so that when you’re able to create again, you will have fanned your spark back into a flame. sometimes its hard to see those moments as anything but stagnation, but he always says that they’re natural and healthy and needed—things that should be embraced rather than feared.

If I were a USWNT player, I’d be pissed and feel so disrespected and belittled. The coach saying the game plan was to settle for a draw? And to even admit that is embarrassing.

Like you’re the number one team in the world and you’re telling these players to settle for a draw? That’s just not it dude. I really can’t see you being around here long if that’s how it’s gonna be.

If it’s a great game and you lose, I wouldn’t be happy, but anything is better than this shit show waste of my time.

what do you do when you're lonely?

It depends. There are different kinds of lonely, aren’t there?

There’s the quiet kind. It’s almost light. It’s the soft realisation that nobody has understood you for quite a while - in fact, you’re not really sure when you last felt understood. It settles around you like a blanket and you let it. It’s a return to familiarity.

When I feel like this, I go for a walk, or write a poem, and think a lot. Usually, I realise that it is an impossible task to expect anybody to understand me completely but I am understandable in fragments to different people at different times and that is okay. The most important thing is that I understand myself.

There is the specific kind. When you feel isolated or left out or unloved by a particular person or group of people. When you don’t understand why. When you feel that there must be something wrong with you, something different or awkward that makes you difficult to love. It’s heavy and shameful.

When I feel like this, I think about my perceived differences and realise that I have people in my life who are grateful for them. I think about whether I am truly being excluded or whether I’ve just interpreted a situation in that way because of my defense mechanisms. And I talk to my loved ones because everybody needs a reminder that they’re loveable from time to time.

Finally, there is a violent kind of lonely. It is desperate. Chronic. Hopeless. For me, it accompanies a period of being continuously misunderstood. Being called selfish when you were trying to be selfless. Being called cruel when you thought you were acting out of kindness. Being called defensive when you were trying to communicate. Being told you didn’t care when you know you did. It isolates you from everyone, even you from yourself. This is when you begin to wonder whether people really mean it when they say they love you.

I think this kind of loneliness can only be solved by looking deep inside and trusting yourself to be who you think you are. To have conviction that you are kind, and compassionate, and imperfect, but good. And to know that you are loveable because of these things.

😄😄

🚨 SUPERCORP ENDGAME ALERT 🚨

Their hugs then:

one arm over the other's shoulder, other arm over the ribs/waist

upper body a bit angled and shifted to the side, therefore the hug a little unbalanced and not so tight

best fiends' hug

Their hugs now:

Kara's arms around Lena's neck, Lena's arms around Kara's chest

bodies in perfect symmetry, naturally snuggle into each other tightly

girlfriends' hug

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk! 😊

well she’s not wrong