'Why did I end up doing it?'

Clara knows she's reckless. Everyone around her keeps on telling her that. But sleeping with Bruce? Why did she have to do that? She'd broken the promise she had made to herself all those years ago. Both of them had. They had agreed on it. And now...

And now...this.

'Reckless, Clara, so reckless,' Her conscience whispers to her. 'But you know why you did it. You still...'

'Shut up brain.'

'Just open your eyes and look. Are you sure you made the right call?'

'Stupid conscience,' Clara mutters under her breath. She twists around on the bed, a heavy blanket draped over her body and opens her eyes, only to be greeted with an empty bed. She blinks, disoriented for a second.

"Bruce?" Her voice is husky, full of sleep. She blinks again and turns her head to the right, where she sees Bruce standing in front of the window, in all his shirtless glory (but with pants, she notes in disappointment before mentally slapping herself). She starts to get up, only to realise that she is still completely naked. "Where are my clothes?"

"You're up," Bruce states, as he turns to meet her green eyes. "Good morning."

"Morning," Clara greets in reply, voice wavering as she suddenly remembers everything they did last night. 'Okay, let's not even go there right now.'

"How do you feel?" Bruce asks, as he pulls away from the window and walks towards the bed. "Are you feeling better now?"

"In relation to what exactly? If you're talking about me being sick, I'm completely okay. But if you're talking in terms of what we did last night..." In spite of her slight embarrassment at the situation, the slightest smirk covers her face. "I definitely feel better. So much better. Like better than I've ever been."

Bruce smiles wickedly as he sits in front of her on the bed, leaning closer to her. "Now, if you say things like that, it makes me want to kiss you all over again."

"Then why don't you?" Clara looks at him, with a challenge in her eyes and a grin on her face. She leans closer to him, careful to keep the blanket up to her chest with one hand as she reaches for Bruce with the other. They kiss, once again. And it is the same feeling they had felt before and continue to feel. The same fire, the same passion...the same everything.

It feels familiar to kiss Bruce. (Almost like coming home...but you didn't hear it from Clara.)

When she pulls away, she stares into his eyes with warmth before burying her face into his neck, thinking of all the times, she'd imagined herself doing this. And did this. Then, they stopped. 'I wish I could have this moment every day. Why did we even stop? Stupid Bruce and his rules. And stupid me for listening to them.'

"Bruce," Clara's voice is muffled, her breath warm against his skin. "I want to try again."

"Again?"

"Yeah, I want to try again. Us, I mean. I know it's too much to ask because you have that silly rule about not wanting to date in the team, and you're Bruce Wayne for crying out loud and I'm just me, a simple photographer from Michigan. But seriously, I wanna try."

"Clara..."

"And you don't have to say yes to me right now. Or say yes in general, although that might make me a little emotional, but, I don't think you need to know that. The thing is..,"

"Clara!"

Startled, Clara pulls away from her position, meeting Bruce's dark eyes. "What-Sorry, I must have been rambling. You know I tend to do that when I'm nervous and I'm so nervous right now because this is kind of tough for me to admit to you."

"Do you really want to?" Bruce suddenly grabs her shoulders gently, his hands very warm.

"Yeah, I do," Clara immediately nods. "I really do. Like I said, you don't have to say anything right now. You can think it all over."

"I don't need to think about it," He admits with the slightest smirk. "I already know my answer."

"Which is?"

"Yes."

And Clara thinks she almost dies out of the exploding happiness she suddenly feels

"You're in a good mood," Aurelia notes, looking at her aunt's cheery face. "Did something happen?"

"Maybe," Clara answers with an elusive smile, her eyes holding a strange but weirdly familiar motion. She hands Aurelia her coffee cup before taking a sip out of her own, the smile still on her face. "Maybe something did."

"Judging by the look on your face, you're not gonna tell me," Aurelia says, sipping her coffee. Perfect, hot coffee on a cold winter day, two days before Christmas. "So should I even ask?"

"Nope," Clara tilts her head towards her niece, grinning at the pouty face she makes. "Don't even bother."

"Alright, fine, I won't push it. But I will find out. Trust me on that."

"Oh, I do. I sure do."

Clara laughs, before taking another sip of her coffee. "Shouldn't you be getting ready? She should be here any moment now."

"Oh, oh, yes...I forgot for a second that Donna was gonna be coming here tonight," Aurelia suddenly remembers the plans discussed by the two last week, that Donna would come and spend Christmas with them because the two hadn't spend time with each other in a while. (And Donna also didn't want to go back to Themyscira for some reason, but she hadn't mentioned why.)

She immediately gets up, chugs her coffee like a vodka shot and places the empty cup down on the centre table. The coffee burns her throat slightly, but she deals with the pain with ease and wipes her mouth. "I'm going to change. You clean up the place," Aurelia motions towards the still not decorated living room. "You're good at that."

Clara smiles and nods, taking another sip of her coffee, "Sure, young lady. You just get dressed."

"And that's exactly what I'm going to do," With a dramatic bow, like a theatre actor at the end of a play, Aurelia bounds to her room. It doesn't take her a second to hurry over to the closet and grab her favourite jacket, one that Donna gave her a few Christmases ago. She throws it on over the full-sleeved t-shirt and then grabs her favorite pair of jeans. She quickly takes off her Flash pyjamas and puts on the jeans.

The doorbell rings and Aurelia almost lets out a shout of excitement, before stifling her mouth. She hears Clara opening the door and welcoming Donna inside.

Before she can stop herself, she's already running back outside into the living room, not even noticing how it's suddenly decorated with fairy lights and a Christmas tree stands right next to their TV. What a holiday miracle. (Or magic)

Donna spots her. She's dressed in a long black coat, her dark falls over her shoulders and in her hand, she's holding her overnight bags. As soon as she meets Aurelia's eyes, her face splits into a wide grin. She drops the bags to the floor and runs towards the younger girl.

"Aurelia!" Donna greets in a rather flamboyant tone. "I missed you so much!"

"Donna!" Aurelia greets back, equally dramatic. "There's so much I have to tell you." She hugs the older girl, with a wide smile on her face. "So much." Especially the fact that Dick and I are dating...I can't believe I never talked about this with her.

"Oh, I have things to tell you too," Donna replies, pulling away from the hug. "But I'm glad I came here."

"So am I," Aurelia shoots her a grin before turning towards her aunt, who is watching the exchange with a smile. "Clara, you don't mind if I ditch patrol tonight? You'll manage on your own?"

"Yeah, I definitely can," Clara replies, doing a thumbs-up in her general direction. "You young ladies have fun catching up."

"Okay!" Aurelia enthusiastically replies, before basically dragging Donna in the direction of her room. Once both of them are inside, she shuts the door behind them.

"You look happy," Donna points out, half smiling as she takes off her coat. She sits on Aurelia's bed, keeping the coat next to her. "Something happen?"

"Yeah, you came here," Aurelia grins as she sits next to the girl who is like her older sister. "I'm very happy about that."

Donna places a hand on her heart, throwing her hair back in a dramatic fashion. "You know how to flatter a girl, don't you."

"Of course, I do. It's part of my charm."

"Oh that I can agree with for sure. Aurelia Hall without her quirky charm is just boring."

"Did you actually just say 'quirky' out loud? Donna, you okay?"

Donna lets out a laugh, patting Aurelia's shoulder. "Why yes, I did. I just like using the word."

"Well don't," Aurelia replies with a giggle of her own. "That makes you sound like someone from Mean Girls."

"Hey! I like Mean Girls, okay?" Donna playfully shoves her with her arm. "And besides, Regina George wouldn't even stand a chance in front of me. Just saying."

"Okay, okay, I can see that happening." Aurelia says with a grin. "And before I start telling you everything, I just wanted to ask you something."

"Go on," Donna motions with a wave of her hand.

"Why didn't you go to Themyscira for this Christmas?" Aurelia asks, in what she hopes is not an offensive tone. "Not that I don't mind you spending it with me, but it's kinda weird to have you here when you're usually living in an actual paradise,"

"Oh, yeah," Donna's expression falters slightly, but a smile still remains on her face. "Diana and I...I kind of had a fight with her."

"You fought with Wonder Woman?"

"No, not like that. All words."

"But why did you two fight? What happened?"

"It's about Wonder Girl. I kind of wanted a break from things for a bit, you know. Move away from things for a bit, but she was against it."

"You don't wanna be Wonder Girl anymore?" Aurelia asks, voice soft. This is not the answer she was expecting.

"No no, I do," Donna shakes her head, the smile almost gone now. "Wonder Girl is one of the best things in my life, but I just don't want to be in Diana's shadow anymore. I wanna do my own thing, you know."

Yeah, Aurelia did know. She would be lying if she admitted that she hadn't thought about pulling away from Clara as Lumen and going off and doing her own thing. There had been long conversations with Dick about this, about how both of them wanted to grow out of their mentors' shadow.

"I get that, I do. I've thought about it too, seeing as I'm starting college in seven months and I've been Lumen continuously for so long now. Kind of want to do my own thing too."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, I've definitely thought about it. Don't tell her Clara though, I've not even initiated that conversation with her."

"Well, don't do it now," Donna says, offering her a half smile. "Things between Diana and I have been okay. But also a little tense too."

"I'm sure it'll work out and you can finally be Donna Troy, Wonder Girl," Aurelia smiles back. "Not Donna Troy, Wonder Woman's sidekick, called Wonder Girl. And you're gonna ace it. Both of us will."

"Sure," Donna nods with the slightest of smiles. "We will ace it."

Both the girls, then, grin at each other. Because they know. They know that if they do this, they're gonna do it together. As a team. As people who want to be more than what they are now.

"Anyways," Donna says after a short pause. "What did you want to tell me?"

"Oh," Aurelia suddenly looks away, feeling heat pool in her cheeks. "Yeah, it's kind of important. So...late November, like last week of the month, Dick and I...we kinda kissed and started dating? Yeah, we're dating"

"Wait, what?!" Donna exclaims out loud. "You're serious?"

"Uh huh, very serious."

"Oh my god, this is amazing! I knew this would happen! I just had a feeling about you two! I'm so happy for you."

Donna puts her arm around Aurelia, pulling her in for a bone-crushing hug. (which in Donna's case is an actual bone-crushing hug.)

"Donna, let go...can't breathe," Aurelia stutters out, a discomforted look on her face. Being hugged to death by an Amazonian is not what she would like.

"Oh sorry, didn't mean to hug you so hard," Donna apologises, a sheepish look on her face. "But I am so happy for you."

In another breath, she adds, "Tell me everything."

We are FINALLY moving into the formation of the Titans!!! I'm so excited for that!!

Things will really start to pick up from here on out, especially as there's only around five or six chapters left for the end of part one. (the number can change because I have a long chapter planned for near the end and I might split it up). 

But there's some important stuff here too, especially foreshadowing regarding the formation of Titans. And what Aurelia feels about moving away from Clara to be Lumen on her own. It's gonna be super important in the next few chapters. This chapter though,,,,it was so much fun to write.

also,,,CLARA AND BRUCE ARE THE SNARKIEST COUPLE EVER!!! (AND YES, THEY'RE TOGETHER ONCE MORE!!)

Anyways, I hope you liked this chapter. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!