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Notes: A while back we mentioned that Jolie was doing a marathon and fundraising for Team in Training, which is an organization that fights leukemia and lymphoma. And many wonderful, generous LJ folk contributed to Jolie's fund, helping her to reach and actually even surpass her goal of $2100. In fact, from LJ donations alone we raised over $500! In short, you guys rock. That money goes to fund cancer research and support for cancer survivors and their families--it pays for things like hotel stays in strange cities, travel for treatment, and new clinical trials. As anyone who's been affected by any kind of cancer knows, it's money for a good cause. So thank you all for contributing.

And now, since I mentioned those drabbles, here's the first part of one for moosesal, who asked for Clark/Lex. It's been a while since I lived anywhere near Smallville, but I'll give it my best shot of what I can scramble together on the basis of my Extremely Small Knowledge of the SV-verse. For instance, I don't really know how old any of the characters were supposed to be any given point. Mea culpa! Also, I should point out this is supposed to be happening after "Exile," which I think was the season finale for S2. After Clark runs away to Metropolis and is all Red K, anyway. It's goofy, it's angsty, it's vapid as all getout...it's Untitled Contribution Clex!!!

 

Where The Deer and the Antelope Play part 1

Clark woke up on a very nice sofa, with a serious headache. For a minute he just lay where he was, not moving anything but his eyes. His head throbbed. The sofa was dark blue, possibly velvet. There was too much light in the room.

Slowly, he realized he could hear things. People. Moving around in other parts of the house. Faintly, he could hear footsteps approaching down a carpeted hall. For just a second, he closed his eyes again. If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. Said...somebody. He couldn't remember.

The footsteps--male, unhurried, confident--were getting closer. With a groan, Clark opened his eyes and levered himself upright on the couch. His limbs were made of lead. The room was large, high-ceilinged, with stained glass windows and a big desk covered with files and papers. Somebody's office. What was he doing on the couch in some stranger's office? And why did his tongue feel like coarse-grade sandpaper? And why was he wearing boxers and a Beefy T?

And what the hell was his name?

His heart kicked up as if he'd just glanced over his shoulder and realized he was standing on the edge of an uncovered well. He didn't know his name. He must know his name. Everybody had a name. His was...

He sat still, eyes tight with effort, trying to fish-hook something from the dark, uncertain waters of memory. He remembered...nothing. Goose egg. He was a brand-new baby, alone in the world. With a bad salty taste in his mouth, he got up and did a quick search around the sofa. He'd been sleeping under a throw. It was soft and blue and looked like it went with the sofa. He didn't even have his own throw.

"Okay," he muttered, trying to stop his hands from clenching. "Okay, calm down. There's an explanation for this."

The footsteps were just outside the office door now, and he looked that way, hoping desperately that whoever it was would pass on by, and that he'd come in and make everything fall into place. Maybe this was his own house. Maybe he was rich, and that was his butler outside, with a glass of freshly-squeezed orange juice on a silver salver.

The doorknob turned, and the door opened. Clark tensed, ready to run.

He wasn't expecting a skinny, tired-looking bald guy to walk in, glance at him, and raise an eyebrow without surprise. He wasn't expecting the guy to come in, close the door behind him, and walk across the room to the very nice-looking bar without a word. There wasn't a script for any of this, but somehow a tired bald guy in dress pants wasn't something he was prepared to handle.

"You're awake," the bald guy said, turning back from the bar with a glass in one hand and a blue bottle in the other.

Clark glanced at the closed door, then looked back at the guy. "Uh," he said, and was startled at the strange familiarity of his own voice. "Yeah."

The bald guy leaned against the bar and let the neck of the bottle fall against the glass, filling it with water. All his movements seemed strangely heavy and passive, as if he were exhausted, barely holding himself upright. His heartbeat was slow and steady.

"How do you feel?" he asked, setting the bottle carefully on the bar and raising the glass to his lips.

Clark opened his mouth, then closed it. He had the bizarre feeling that he should start out by thanking this guy for the use of his sofa. It was a very nice sofa.

"Where are my clothes?" he asked instead, trying not to sound too defensive. A thought struck him. "I mean...I have clothes, right?"

The guy looked at him a little oddly, and lowered the glass. "You...have clothes."

There was a pause. They eyed each other.

"I should get dressed," Clark said, conveying with his tone the absolute inevitability and rightness of the idea. "I should--" He turned back and picked up the throw. He was barefoot, he realized.

"I'll have them brought in," the guy said, sounding somehow a little more reserved, a little warier. There was another pause. Clark folded the throw and tossed it onto the arm of the sofa.

"Okay," he said, with false decisiveness, turning back to face the bald guy. "That would be great. And then, I'll just...be...going."

A line had formed between the bald guy's eyebrows. It was a thoughtful, assessing kind of line. He was still leaning against the bar, holding his glass of water as if it were a tumbler of scotch, but there were slight changes in the angles of his shoulders and neck that read: what is going on here? They must know each other. Something must be wrong with this picture.

"I'm really sorry," Clark blurted, crossing his arms tightly over his chest. "I'm just...I'm a little confused, that's all."

The line didn't disappear from between the guy's eyes. If anything, he looked a little harder now. Not surprised, but not happy either.

"Of course," he said, setting the glass down beside the bottle on the bar. "I understand. You should get back to the family farm, greet the parents. They've been worried." There was coolness there now, and an acid undertone.

"Right," Clark said, hurrying on without thinking. "Home." Home was a farm? He had parents? "I should...they're probably...I'm really sorry about this."

"Not at all." The guy walked across the room to the big desk and picked up the phone. "Nina, tell the laundry I need the last load brought in, please." He depressed the cutoff with his forefinger, then put the receiver gently back in the cradle. When he looked up, his eyes were flat. "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

Clark swallowed. "I don't think so."

The guy arched an eyebrow. For a second, a smile seemed about to creep from the corner of his lip. "Are you sure about that?" There was a pause, and then he added, with mysterious emphasis, "'Kal'?"

Kal. That must be his name. Clark seized on it distractedly, testing it in his mind, trying for recognition. It felt...sort of right. How would he know if he'd even recognize his own name? Kal. Weird name. But that was the least of his worries.

"I'm sure," he said, sinking down onto the arm of the sofa, prying at the locked vault door in his brain. He had an almost physical sensation of not being able to get purchase.

The guy stood up, and Clark realized he'd missed something--there'd been an opening there, and he'd done something wrong, because now the guy was shooting the sleeves of his nice white shirt, and smiling thinly, and heading for the door. Everything about him looked tired and tight. At the door, he paused and turned.

"You'll want some privacy," he said, with cutting politeness. "The bathroom's through there if you want to wash up." He nodded at the far wall, and Clark noticed a door in the wood paneling beside the bookshelf. Wash up? Why did he need to--

"Say hello to Jonathan and Martha for me," the guy said, and again Clark had the sense he was missing something major, but there was no time to grapple with that, because the guy opened the door and walked out and away down the carpeted hall.

Leaving Clark to discover alone that beneath his boxers and T-shirt, he was a lurid abstract painting of sex he couldn't remember having.

 

 

part 2

He washed up. He dressed in the clothes that he found sitting neatly, discreetly folded on the armchair by the door when he finished washing up. They consisted of: dark jeans, dark button-up shirt, black socks, black leather jacket. They were all huge, and they all fit perfectly. He was kind of big, he realized. Dressing, he found himself studying the backs of his hands and his kneecaps. Looking for scars or marks, signs of life. Nothing. He lived on a farm, apparently. He was a farm boy. With a leather jacket and unscarred hands.

"There's an explanation for all of this," he muttered, buttoning his fly and trying the pockets of the jacket. Keys. Car keys, he thought at first--then he realized they were for a motorcycle. He was a farm boy with a motorcycle.

It was a motorcycle he was going to have to get some other time, though, because when he ventured out into the hall, nobody was around. He could still hear the faint sounds of humanity in some other part of the house--dishes, water running, a woman on a telephone--but the bald guy was long gone and discretion seemed like the better part of everything. He zipped his jacket up to his chin and found his way out through the tall, silent hallways.

Outside in the sunshine, walking quickly down the long drive, he rifled through the rest of his stuff. A big wad of bills, twenties and fifties and hundreds, too much to count. A bunch of wrapped condoms. A little plastic bag of unidentifiable pills, white and blue and pink. He almost tossed that into a bush, but remembered in time that he was on someone else's property, and the last thing he should do was litter.

"I'm Kal," he said, turning around and walking backwards with his hands in his pockets, fingering the condoms and the pills. The house behind him was stately and ivied. The grounds were green, the gardens lush. "Kal. My name's Kal." There was no wallet in his pocket, no ID, nothing to give him any more than that. Just one syllable, spoken by a bald guy who looked ready to sleep for a week.

He turned his back on the house and walked to the end of the drive, where it passed through a low stone wall and met a two-lane highway with no cars in sight. On the other side of the highway was a sloping golden field of late summer corn. He stared at it. Then he turned left and started to walk.

 

 

The beat-up old blue Ford slowed down as it passed him, then veered into the breakdown lane and waited, dust curling over the tailgate. Clark paused, then kept walking until he was even with the passenger side window. Inside the cab was a miniature, liver-spotted man with the wizened beak of an ancient turtle. His dark turtle eyes studied Clark from beneath the brim of his Pickseed hat. He didn't look surprised.

"Hi," Clark said, keeping his distance from the side of the truck.

The little old man's eyes traveled down to Clark's shoulders and chest, then back to his face. He rolled his mouth judiciously, and inclined his head a degree to the left.

"Back from the big city," he observed, in a voice of infinite age and patience.

"You are?" Clark asked. Then he realized the man was talking about him. "Oh. Right. Yeah, I am. I'm...back."

There was a pause. The Ford's engine growled, and the blue smell of exhaust crept up Clark's nose. He squinted and tried not to sneeze.

"I'm, uh..." He glanced at the back of the cab. No rifle rack, as far as he could see. The guy looked like he weighed about eighty pounds, soaking wet. "I wonder if you could give me a lift...home?"

The little old man glanced again at Clark's jacket, and worked his mouth as if he were testing out different things to say. Clark tried to look inoffensive.

"Could do," the man said finally, turning his head so his aged gaze was directed back at the road.

Clark waited. Nothing happened. After a minute he realized that was all he was going to get, and stepped up to open the Ford's passenger door. "Thanks so much, Mr... Uh, I really appreciate it."

The man grunted and wrestled the gear shift into drive, then fished with his foot until he found the gas. The Ford surged back onto the pavement, swung across the center line, and started back in the opposite direction. Clark sank into the bench seat, inhaling the strangely familiar scents of dry tobacco, hay, and manure. He wondered if he'd recognize home when he saw it.

 

 

He didn't, but nobody noticed. The turtle man dropped him at the end of a long drive leading up to a picture-perfect farm: red barn, silo, pastures, well-kept house with flower boxes in the windows. He didn't turn his head when Clark opened his door and got tentatively out, or when Clark closed the door and said, "Thanks very much," through the open window. All he did was nod at the road, as if he'd reached a gentleman's agreement with it, and put the Ford into drive. Clark stepped back and watched the truck pull out in a puff of dust. When it was gone, he turned and stared up the long drive at the farm. Home. It smelled sweet and familiar, like cows.

He made it all the way up to the house without seeing anyone, although he could hear a tractor out back and someone doing dishes inside. On the doorstep, he stood with his hand raised to knock, not knocking. The dishes rattled in the sink. Out back, the tractor's timing was off.

He stood there and stood there and stood there, until finally the tap inside shut off and he heard a woman's footsteps come through the front of the house. He stepped back to get an angle through the white-curtained window to his right. That was how he found himself looking directly at a red-haired woman in a T-shirt and a wet apron, who was looking directly back at him, her face bleaching and her mouth ajar.

He sketched her a quick, unconscious wave, and tried to smile. If she had a house gun, he was probably going to get shot. But she didn't reach for a gun--instead, she shut her mouth and ran past the window and then the front door swung open with a bang and she was rushing at him through the doorway--furious, he thought at first, but then she grabbed him in a vicious, painful hug and he realized that she was shaking, and that she was probably his mother.

 

 

part 3

They sat at the kitchen table with a pot of tea and tried it figure it out.

"Clark," Clark said again, toying with his mug. "My name's Clark, right?"

His mother and father--Martha and Jonathan Kent--glanced at each other, and nodded.

"You really don't remember anything?" his mother asked again, as if she couldn't quite get that part straight. There were worry lines down the sides of her mouth, and between her eyes. "Nothing at all?"

Clark searched his memory again, feeling terrible. He shrugged. His father cleared his throat and put a hand on Martha's shoulder.

"It's probably temporary," he said. "Clark, you must have got those clothes from somewhere. You haven't been living on the street. And you've been gone all summer, so something must have happened more recently to make you forget."

"Right." Clark plucked at the sleeve of his jacket. "Maybe I got hit on the head or something." He was trying for light-hearted, but the comment just seemed to make his parents more glum and worried.

"Or something," Jonathan agreed, glancing at Martha again. She touched her forehead, as if she were getting a headache.

"Clark," she said, and then stopped. Again, they looked at each other. Clark laced his hands between his knees and tried to be patient. Why had the bald guy--Lex, they said--called him Kal, if his name was Clark? And why had he woken up on Lex's sofa?

"Clark," he mother said again, and he tried to give her his attention. "The thing is..." She paused, and Jonathan frowned and nodded. She took a deep breath. "The thing is, I don't think a blow to the head would do this to you."

"Why not?" He ruffled the back of his hair with his fingers, feeling for lumps. "I mean, I feel fine, but maybe it happened a few days ago. That's what happens to people, right? They get knocked out or something and they get amnesia?"

"Yes," she said, smiling faintly. "It sometimes does. But not to you, Clark. You're special."

He paused, his hand out to reach for his cup. Special didn't sound good. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, you're..." She seemed to search for words. "You're not like most people, Clark. You're...different. In a good way." She added that hastily, reaching to touch his big hand with her warm fingers. "Did you...before Mr. Lowenstein picked you up, did you try...running at all? Or jumping?"

He stared at her. The kitchen suddenly seemed too small, a clever trap laid by country eccentrics. He didn't know these people at all. They could be anyone. They could be total wackos.

"What I'm trying to say," Martha went on, leaning forward earnestly, "is that you've been our son for eighteen years, and I've never seen you get a bloody nose or a cut or even a cold. You don't get hurt, Clark. So whatever did this to you--" She trailed off, losing ground at the look in his eyes.

He pushed his chair back an inch and gave her the best smile he could muster. "I think I should probably be going."

She looked stricken, and he felt an immediate surge of guilt, but it didn't drown out the alarm bells ringing in the back of his head. These people were weird. He wasn't special, he might not even be their son, and he wasn't going to stay in some total strangers' house, not when he had a few hundred bucks in his pocket.

"I'm sorry," he started to say, starting to stand up, but Jonathan beat him to it. He got up and walked to the back door, opened it, and stood to the side.

"Come out here a minute," he said, his tone firm and farmerish, brooking no opposition. Clark gave Martha an apologetic look, then headed cautiously for the back door. Jonathan was already walking out, down the back steps to the gravel pullaround in back, where he'd left the tractor. "Come on down here, son."

Clark hesitated a moment, then followed him down. Together, they stood beside the tractor. It was an old John Deere, the green of the chassis faded to olive. The engine was still ticking over.

"Grab hold of that," Jonathan said, kicking the bottom of the tractor's body with one boot. Clark gave him a look. He smiled thinly. "Go on."

Carefully, keeping an eye on Jonathan, Clark bent over and gripped the warm metal.

"Lift," Jonathan said.

"Are you nuts?" Clark asked.

"Lift," Jonathan said again.

Clark glanced at Martha, who was standing on the back porch, holding herself tightly as if she were cold. Then he gave a small tug, just to appease the wackos. The tractor rose easily in his hand.

 

 

part 4

"Clark." Lex sounded surprised. He probably was. It was ten o'clock at night, past dark, and Clark had just appeared in the door to his office. It was amazing how easy it was to get by security guards when you could run faster than they could see.

Lex himself was in his desk chair, leaning forward over a folder that he closed automatically, almost casually. There was a glass of whiskey at his elbow, and half a sandwich. He looked bone-tired and unhappy. The folder had been full of schematics, something about an airplane, upside down and too far away to make much sense.

"You must be here for your bike," Lex said, without preamble, pushing his chair back and sliding the folder into a waiting drawer. "I had it put in the back garage. I'll ask Roslyn to bring it around for you." He didn't seem angry now, just...held-in. He was walking around the side of the desk, moving carefully, as if he were sore. His eyes were calm and impersonal.

"Lex." Clark didn't move from the doorway, and Lex stopped where he was. It was strange to say the name--it wasn't familiar, but he knew it should be. They knew each other, after all. They were...friends. Or something.

They stood looking at each other for a few seconds. Finally Lex smiled, although his shoulders didn't loosen much.

"I owe you an apology," he said, rubbing the back of his head with one hand, resting the other on his hip. "I know I behaved badly this morning, and I...think I may have behaved worse before that." He glanced at Clark without raising his head, so quickly it might have been no more than a tic. "I apologize if I...overstepped."

Clark thought of the evidence he'd found dried on his skin. Had that been overstepping? He had no idea. Right now, standing a few feet from Lex, he just wanted to confess. He wanted to unload some of the weight from his own shoulders, dump it on Lex's expensive rug, and say, Forget it, forget everything, just let me stay here again tonight until... Until what, he didn't know.

"You don't have to apologize," he said, because he was pretty sure that was true. "I'm not mad at you." That much was definitely true.

Lex looked relieved, but still wary. "I'm glad to hear it. I'd hate to lose your friendship, Clark."

"I have to tell you something." Clark stopped and bit his lip. Lex was staring at him now, eyes more alert and engaged. You're a predator, Clark thought. Strangely, the realization warmed him.

He wasn't sure what he'd been going to say, but he remembered Martha's worried face, and the warm touch of her fingers on his. She wasn't his mother, but he trusted her. And she didn't trust Lex.

"I..." He paused, glancing back at the broad desk, the closed drawer. "I've been really out of it. I'm sorry."

Lex's expression didn't change, except perhaps to sharpen a little.

"I've just been...confused," Clark went on. "I had to sort some things out."

Lex's shoulders settled a fraction more. "Ah," he said, without moving.

"I talked to...my parents," Clark said. He could feel heat in his cheeks--he was edging around something he couldn't see, something big and dangerous. He was waiting for a hand to reach out in the darkness and grab hold of his, pull him in, show him the way.

"You did," Lex said, without intonation.

"Yeah." Clark looked around the room, at the dark stained glass, the shelves and shelves of books. Nothing like the warm, messy Kent farmhouse. "They were...they were okay, I guess."

"What did you tell them?"

Suddenly he couldn't stand the bite of Lex's gaze anymore. He turned, walked to the nearest bookshelf, and ran a finger along it ludicrously, as if he were checking for dust. "It doesn't matter. They were fine."

"If they were fine," Lex asked, "why are you here?"

Clark took a deep breath and stared at the spines in front of him. Expensive leather dust-free volumes. What good was a book if you didn't read it?

"I'm here," he said, "because I wanted to see you."

There was a pause, and then he heard Lex walk up behind him and Lex's hand slid along his arm from behind, warm and strong. It felt incredibly good. It felt as if nobody had touched him in a year.

"I'm glad," Lex murmured, and Clark let himself ease back until he felt Lex behind him, back to belly, warm breath on the nape of his neck.

I have no idea who you are, he thought. Then he turned around and kissed Lex gently on the mouth.

 

 

part 5

"You're staying at Lex's house," Martha repeated, her expression blank, as if she were waiting for him to finish the sentence. Jonathan stood behind her with his shoulders raised, his face rigid. Briefly, Clark wondered if his father was a violent man.

"Just for a while," he said, stuffing another pair of jeans into his duffel. "Just until I figure some things out."

"Figure some things--" She shook her head. "Clark, I don't understand. What do you need to figure out?"

"What happened to me, for one thing." He cinched the bag tight and glanced around the loft. Nothing that he recognized anyway, so nothing for him to miss. "Maybe...why I woke up there. I don't know. I just--" He turned and caught her giving Jonathan a wide-eyed, helpless look. "It's just for a while," he repeated, as gently as he could.

"You're being ridiculous," Jonathan said, crossing his arms over his chest. "Lex Luthor is the last person you should be spending time with--"

"Maybe he knows something. Something about what happened to me."

"You don't want Lex knowing anything, Clark. He's been trying to figure you out for years--this is just the chance he's been looking for, to find out about your abilities."

"I'll be careful." Clark hoisted the bag over his shoulder and turned to face them. Martha looked stricken, close to panic. His father looked quietly furious.

"You don't know what you're doing," Martha said softly, extending her hands toward him, palms together, as if she were praying.

"That's the problem," he said, resisting the urge to let the bag drop. "That's what I need to figure out."

"I'll tell you what you're doing," said Jonathan. "You're making a very big mistake."

"Maybe," Clark said. He started for the stairs, and Jonathan grabbed his arm. Clark stopped, but didn't turn.

"Your mother already lost you once," Jonathan said. "Don't put her through it again."

She's not my mother and I don't know who she is, Clark thought. He didn't say it, though. Instead he lifted his arm a fraction, until Jonathan let it go. Then he walked down the stairs and through the barn and out into the sunshine.

 

 

"It's a Bellini," Lex said, handing him a glass full of orange juice. "Peach juice and champagne." He raised his own in a minute, ironic toast. "Try it."

Clark gave the glass a critical look, then sipped. It tasted sweet and fizzy. "Wow." He wasn't sure what he was supposed to say. It was two o'clock in the afternoon, according to the clock on Lex's wall. Champagne felt drastic and sort of assholic, two steps away from shooting skeet over the infinity pool.

Lex gave him a look over the top of his own glass. "Or there's beer, if you'd rather."

"Oh--no." Clark swigged half the rest of the drink, and smiled. "It's great, thanks."

There was a brief pause, while Lex looked at him. He's been trying to figure you out for years, Jonathan had said. Suddenly self-conscious, Clark turned away and studied the room. They were in a new one, one he couldn't remember seeing before. It was in the back of the house, with floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over the green lawn and blue pool. There was a big fireplace, with a pair of crossed swords over it. The carpet was thick and white, and the sofa was the color of viscera. Lex had called it the television room, dropping his jacket carelessly over the arm of the organ meat sofa, but there didn't seem to be a television in it.

"How did your parents take the news?" Lex asked, putting his own drink down on the smooth, dark wood of the bar, and reaching for another glass. He was wearing a pale blue shirt, trim and neat, perfectly pressed, tucked into dark trousers. Apart from the slightly chewed look of his lips and his general air of satisfied fatigue, there was nothing to show how he'd spent last night.

"They were..." Clark thought of Jonathan's hand on his arm, the symbolic grab. "They weren't all that okay with it, I guess."

Lex said nothing. He cracked open another blue bottle and filled a glass with water, then handed it to Clark. Clark took it with relief and drank half of it. When he looked up, Lex was studying him again.

"They were probably surprised," Lex said. "It is a bit unexpected, after all. Clark Kent moving into the House of Luthor." He smiled, but Clark could hear the capitals in his tone. The House of Luthor. Like something out of Poe.

"I guess," he said, staring down into his glass. He heard Lex move and looked up, expecting to see him approach. But he'd picked up his glass and was walking to the windows, gazing out over the back garden. After a minute, Clark joined him.

"You have a really nice yard," he said, watching the water lap at the edge of the pool.

"You think so," Lex said. It didn't sound like a question, but he'd turned to look at Clark with an air of expectation. Clark scratched the back of his neck.

"Um...yes?"

"The land itself isn't as good as what your farm's on," Lex said, sipping his peach juice. "There's an easement that cuts across back there--" he gestured with his glass. "But my father had sixty thousand dollars' worth of mixed evergreens put in, so you can't see it."

Clark stared at the distant line of green. "Oh."

Lex nodded, drained his glass, and turned to set it down on a coffee table. "It's the Luthor way. If thine eye offend thee."

"Plant trees in front of it," Clark said.

"Buy it off," Lex corrected, then kissed him. His mouth tasted of peaches and good wine. A part of Clark's mind thought, This is probably not a good idea. The rest of him, including his dick, thought, God yes good more.

"I made reservations at Soleil for eight thirty," Lex said into Clark's mouth, his fingers sliding into the waist of Clark's jeans, pulling out his shirt. "It's a two hour drive to Metropolis. Or we can take the helicopter."

"Take the--" Clark lost the word in another kiss. Then he forgot about it, because this was a world of featherweight tractors and forgotten mothers and hot-mouthed business tycoons who didn't even sit down to dinner until nine o'clock, after half an hour for cocktails. It was a world of sixty-thousand-dollar evergreen plantations and orgasms that made the insides of his eyelids glow red like molten iron. Of course there were helicopters. Of course.

"We have some time," Lex said, pushing him backward until the blood-red sofa hit the back of his knees, and then helping him to sit, to lie back, to let go.

 

 

Soleil was the French word for sun--somehow Clark knew that. But the place itself was all grey cement and green granite, low tables and long bench seats with circular stone plates like manhole covers behind them. Their reservation was for eight thirty, Lex had said. It was nine when they walked in. They'd taken the helicopter. Leaving the ground, Clark had had the strangest feeling of familiarity--the vertigo in the pit of his stomach was taut and exciting, like the feeling he got from Lex's body pressed against his own.

The lateness didn't seem to matter. Lex had called ahead, lying on his back on the deep white carpet while Clark shrugged back into his shirt--but it had sounded pretty rote, like Lex was doing it the same way he thanked the housekeeper. Because he was polite, not because he had to. It was hard to know how to feel about that.

"Something to drink?" Lex slid into the seat first, still in his blue shirt, a little wrinkled between the shoulders now. The hostess hovered, smiling like a model. Clark shook his head and Lex slid the drink menu back across the table for her to take. "A bottle of sparkling water, please."

She left and Clark sat, conscious of the way his knees pressed against the underside of the table, conscious of the fact that he was wearing a ten-dollar T-shirt and jeans. Lex sat sunk into the bench, his eyes circled with fatigue, a faint smile on his lips. His leg didn't touch Clark's, and he kept his hands on top of the table, where everyone could see them.

"You look wiped out," Clark said, realizing that he was tired too. Lex's smile widened.

"I am."

There was a brief pause, just long enough for meaning to be conveyed, and then the waiter brought their bottle of water, together with a plate of bread and olive oil. Clark glanced at the menu beside his elbow, then looked more closely. The prices looked wrong.

"I'll have the filet," Lex said, without opening his menu. "Medium rare."

The waiter nodded and turned to Clark. He hesitated, wiping his mouth with his palm. "I'll have a salad."

The waiter paused.

"Try the lamb," Lex said diffidently. "It's light."

"I'm okay."

"He'll have the lamb," Lex said, sliding the menu back to the waiter.

For a moment Clark sat staring at the table in front of him, thinking of the roll of money in the pocket of his leather jacket. He'd left the jacket at Lex's house. He hadn't been thinking. Obviously. But even if he'd brought it...he'd thought a few hundred bucks was a small fortune, enough to keep him going until he figured out what next. But in Lex's world, it was just enough to buy dinner.

"My treat," Lex said, on cue. Clark glanced sideways. Lex was still half-reclining in his seat, but his eyes were sharper now, fixed on Clark's face.

"I can't afford this," Clark muttered, lacing his fingers together and staring at his knuckles.

"I can," Lex said easily. "That's why it's my treat."

"Maybe we should talk about this. I mean, if I'm going to stay at your place for a while--"

"I promise you, Clark, my life is not actually a whirlwind of helicopter rides and playboy excesses. Or not anymore." Lex's smile was rueful. "I spend most of my time at my desk, or in my father's offices, making sure Luthor is one of the most hated names in the state. But tonight--" He stretched his arms out and let them fall on the top of the bench on either side of him, the picture of relaxation. "Let me enjoy it a little, okay?"

Clark felt a tickle of warmth in the pit of his stomach, and ducked his head to stare at his hands again. Under the table, Lex's shoe brushed his briefly, then moved away again. Conceivably accidental.

"Okay," he said.

 

 

The lamb was excellent, and so was the wine, and after that there was a small plate of fresh figs and cheese, none of which he'd ever tasted before, as far as he knew. Eating the figs made him feel sort of strange--they were so blatantly sexual, and Lex ate them in such a matter-of-fact way, as if you could do anything you wanted, anywhere you wanted, as long as you didn't let on that it was unusual. Something about it made Clark's thighs tighten, and he left the second half of the fruit uneaten on his plate.

"Do you know that guy?"

Clark looked up to see Lex folding his napkin, lifting his chin at someone sitting at the bar. It was late, Clark was tired. He glanced at the bar, sure there was a mistake. But in fact there was a guy sitting there, nursing a martini, looking straight at him. Young, clean-cut, suited. Dark skin and eyes, no rings. Nothing about him rang a bell.

"No," Clark said, but the guy raised his glass and tipped it toward them, then drank. When he lowered the glass again, there was a knowing smile on his lips. He looked directly at Clark--I see you, I know you--and then turned away, apparently dismissing them.

"An acquaintance from this summer, maybe." Lex's tone was casual, no edge to it. Still, Clark flushed.

"I don't know who he is."

Lex reached over and fished the uneaten fruit from Clark's plate. With his eyes on the guy at the bar, he popped it into his mouth and chewed ruminatively.

"Well, he seems to know you."

Clark rubbed his knuckles into the heat in his cheek and kept his eyes on the table.

 

 

part 6

Back home, Lex was a sleepwalker, shuffling through the halls with half-closed eyes, yawning until his jaw cracked.

"I've never seen you this tired," Clark said, with all honesty.

"It's the flying," Lex said, kicking open the door to his bedroom. "Ever since the plane went down, flying scares me. It tires me out."

What plane? Clark thought, hurrying to follow as Lex walked into the room, unbuttoning his shirt in transit. He had a feeling he was supposed to know what Lex was talking about. He didn't have time to think about it, though, because Lex stopped short and turned halfway, his eyes red and bleary, his fingers fumbling with his watch strap.

"I'm sorry," he said, as if he'd just realized he didn't know Clark's name. "There's a room down the hall if you want it."

Clark stood open-mouthed, caught in the headlights. "Uh--" He had no idea what he was supposed to say. Was this Lex's rich, polite way of asking him to leave? Against his will, his gaze slid to the bed. The housekeeper must have been in; the covers were neat again. "Uh."

Lex's smile was probably only halfway as fond as it looked. He was tired, and that softened his expression. He undid the clasp of his watch and tossed it onto the bureau with a clack.

"Come to bed," he said quietly, and led the way.

 

 

Two days passed. Despite what Lex had said about desks and offices, they spent the time doing absolutely nothing useful. They stayed in bed until close to noon, riding the slow waves of sexual cravings. Every time they started up again, Clark felt more familiar, more comfortable, more at ease with himself and Lex. He stopped worrying that Lex was going to see him in an unguarded moment, when he was ugly with need, or when he was microfissuring the headboard in his fists. He stopped thinking about money, and Mars, and a set of undisclosed obligations with his name on them, back in the dusty hayloft of the Kent family farm. He lay back and watched the smile grow on Lex's lips, felt the answering warmth in his own chest, and just let everything else slide.

On the third morning, he lay dozing in Lex's big bed, feeling panthery and slack, tired in the best possible way. Lex was in the shower. There was a coffee maker on the deep oak windowsill; drunkenly, and with much cursing, Lex had programmed it to produce coffee by eleven o'clock. "Shit in a cup," he'd said equably, weaving his way back to the bed. "But hot shit." So now the room smelled of very good coffee, and Clark lay staring through heavy eyelids at the dark drapes and the slice of sunlight coming through them. If this was how his life was going to be from now on, he thought he could get used to it.

The shower stopped and he blinked and glanced toward the bathroom door. After a minute or two, Lex stepped out, towel-clad. He looked brighter and fuller than he had a few days before. His eyes were sharp, his motions quick and neat. He was putting his watch on, studying Clark with a half-smile.

"What set you off?" he asked, as if they were in the middle of a conversation already. Clark frowned, trying to focus.

"What...where?"

"Metropolis." Lex gave him a meaningful look, reaching back into the bathroom for a bottle of aftershave. Clark knew exactly how it smelled. His dick twitched, Pavlovian. "Summer in the big city, cutting the apron strings. Exploring your..." He slapped a few drops onto his throat and put the bottle back. "Self."

Clark squinted. Good question, he thought. "I don't know. I guess I just got...fed up?"

Lex's brow furrowed. "Clark Kent, fed up? That's hard to believe."

"Maybe I just got tired."

"Tired of what?"

"I don't know." Clark rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. He could feel heat in his cheeks, and tightness in his chest. It was a bad feeling, the feeling of walking on very thin ice. He was stupid not to have known they'd come back to this at some point. "Tired of...living on a farm, maybe? Tired of being told what to do by people who aren't even my real parents? Maybe I just wanted a little space, you know?"

"Clark--whoah." Lex walked to the side of the bed and stood over it, intercepting Clark's gaze with a frown. "Hey. I'm not judging, okay?"

Clark ran a hand over his face and took a deep breath.

"I'm the last person to judge," Lex went on, sitting down on the side of the bed. "I spent a few years playing those same kinds of games, okay? I know what it's like."

"Yeah." I wish I did, Clark thought. Metropolis had been as foreign as Smallville. He'd gone hoping that something there would jog his memory, but nothing had. Not even the guy at the bar in Soleil, staring at him like he knew exactly what Clark looked like under his T-shirt and jeans. Like he wasn't a bit surprised to see him sitting there with Lex Luthor, junior raja, at his side.

"I'm just wondering what set you off," Lex went on, studying Clark's face with a slight frown. "You always seemed so...content."

"Content?" Clark grabbed at the straw, studying it for clues. He was a contented farm boy. With pills in his pockets. "I mean, yeah. I guess so. But enough was enough, you know?"

Lex said nothing. He just waited, his eyes on Clark's face. He's been trying to figure you out for years.

"I guess," Clark said, taking a deep breath, "I was just tired of being myself."

"So you decided to be somebody else for a while." Lex looked thoughtful. Then he looked back down at Clark, his eyes clear and direct. "And who are you right now?"

"I'm--" Clark swallowed, and his throat clicked.

There was a short, sharp knock on the door, and then it opened without a pause. Clark jumped, scrambling to cover himself with the sheets. Lex's heart leapt too, but he didn't betray it. He just sat very still and straight, wearing the towel and nothing else, gazing at the man who'd just walked in.

"Dad." The word, on Lex's tongue, sounded like a threat. "I thought I locked that door."

"You're getting sloppy," the man said, stopping in the middle of the carpet and studying Clark with frank interest. He was in his fifties, tall and thin, with graying hair and a slight heart irregularity. Lionel Luthor, Clark realized. Captain of industry, modern-day robber baron. Father of Lex.

"Hello, Clark," said Lionel, with an unpleasant smile. "I have to say, I'm relieved. I came in here thinking I was going to have to fire one of my best informants. But now I see he was right after all. Tell me, son." He turned to Lex, clasping his hands behind his back in an attitude of mock-courtly interest. "How will hell freezing over affect the Nikkei?"

"I'd tell you to get out," Lex said, "but I doubt it would deter you from saying whatever it is you came to say." His voice was steady, but his chest and throat were turning red. Lionel smiled chidingly.

"And you're right." He turned back to Clark, cocking his head like a shrike. For a moment nobody said anything. Clark swallowed, searching with one hand for his clothes beneath the blankets. They were piled on the floor at the foot of the bed, out of reach. Lionel's gaze was too bright, too grotesquely intrigued, to meet.

"You have to excuse me, Clark," Lionel said at last, shaking his head. "My son has done some ridiculous, foolhardy, asinine things in his life, but this puts me at a loss." He paused, his eyes narrowing, his tone changing to one of false concern. "Do your parents know about this?"

"Say what you came to say," Lex gritted. His hand was knotted in the sheets beside Clark's hip.

"I'm sorry to inconvenience you," Lionel said, shifting his attention to Lex. "I know you have a busy schedule to keep, sodomizing the local peasantry. Particularly the son of one of the most upright and respected couples in the county--I understand, Lex, how that must keep you occupied. But perhaps you could spare a moment to consider how unwise this little adventure of yours is." He paused, glanced at Clark, then back at Lex. "Strategically speaking."

Lex's jaw tightened, and he said nothing.

"We had an agreement," Lionel went on, toeing the clothes on the carpet as if they were an exotic specimen of fungus. "You keep your...love life, shall we say, out of the press and out of the gutter, and I give you certain freedoms. I recall that agreement very well, Lex. Do you?"

Lex took a minute to answer. His heart was beating dangerously fast, but his expression was glacial. "I've done nothing wrong."

"Ah." Lionel turned to the windows and looked out. "You married a gold-digger who tried to assassinate you for my money, you went half-mad on a desert island, you scattered the Luthor name through all the major papers in the aftermath, and now you've made a plaything out of Jonathan and Martha Kent's only son." He glanced back over his shoulder, his expression despairing. "Honestly, Lex. I thought you'd put sexual inversion behind you."

Lex stood up. His face was immobile, his eyes bright. "Get out."

"It's my house, Lex." Lionel turned and started for the door. "I'll tell you what--you two sort this out however you like, as long as it's finished today. We'll agree not to discuss it again, and I'll see that your accounts are unfrozen by tomorrow afternoon."

"You can't do that." Lex started across the room in pursuit, his shoulders knotted. Clark took advantage of the opportunity to grab his jeans and shirt from the floor, and started hustling into them beneath the covers. "I'm not a minor. You can't just cut me off--"

"I most certainly can." At the door, Lionel turned and waved a hand at Clark. "Good-bye, Mr. Kent. I look forward to seeing you at all the 4-H socials."

He gave Lex a last significant nod, then pulled the door closed behind him.

Clark buttoned his jeans and yanked his shirt over his head, then leapt out of the bed as if it were hot. Then he didn't know what to do, so he just stood where he was, feeling helpless and sick.

Lex stood unmoving, staring at the door. Clark opened his mouth, then closed it. Something about the set of Lex's shoulders made speech impossible.

Lex turned and walked to the armchair, fished his cell phone out of his trouser pocket, and flipped it open. He hit a number and put it to his ear, starting for the bathroom.

"Who are you calling?" Clark asked. His voice came out sounding thin and weak.

"My attorney," Lex said, disappearing into the bathroom.

Clark stood there for a minute or two, long enough to hear Lex get through the secretary and into conversation with someone named Russell. The exchange was rapid-fire, a few words and a long wait, a few more words. It seemed to be unclear whether Lionel could, in fact, do what he'd threatened to. What did seem clear was that he'd already done it.

Clark went around the room finding his jacket, his socks, his shoes. The contents of his duffel were all over the place, and he wasn't sure yet whether he was really leaving, so he abandoned it. Carrying his shoes, and with his jacket slung over his shoulder, he left the room. Behind him, Lex was saying "No," over and over, his tone colder and tighter every time.

 

 

part 7

The water in the infinity pool was warm and blue and very clean--no leaves or grass besmirched the clarity of a Luthor pool. Clark sat on the edge, his jeans pulled up past his knees, dangling his feet in the water. The sun was hot on the back of his neck. He was holding the plastic bag he'd found in his jacket pocket, the one full of pills and condoms. The money was in his pocket, rolled into a tight bundle that seemed smaller than it had before.

I have no idea where to go from here, he thought, fingering a pill. On the bright side, there was really nothing holding him back from going...anywhere he wanted. He just wished he knew where that was.

The sliding glass door behind him slid open. Without looking around, he knew it was Lex. He knew Lex's footsteps. By now he knew the sound of Lex's heart.

Lex walked to the edge of the pool and stood in silence. The shadow he cast was cool and long. Clark kept his eyes down, rolling the pill in his fingers.

With a sigh, Lex sat down beside him and started rolling up his trouser legs.

"I'm sorry," he said. "That was completely uncalled-for."

"It's not your fault," Clark said. "Your dad's kind of..."

"An asshole."

Clark shrugged. "It's not like I'd expect him to be overjoyed."

Lex finished rolling up his trouser legs and let his feet dangle in the pool. For a while they sat in silence, swinging their feet gently in the water.

"Russell's good," Lex said after a while. "He's opened up some channels, enough to keep us fed and clothed until I get the big guns going."

Clark looked up, squinting in the glare off the pool. "Us?"

Lex gave him a level gaze. "Unless I'm assuming too much."

"No, it's just--" He shrugged, studying the pill again. "I don't know, maybe this is a bad idea. I mean, you have a reputation to think about."

"I have a reputation," Lex said, "as a rich, callous, over-privileged thrill-seeker. A reputation I earned when I was younger, I hasten to add." He reached over and took the pill out of Clark's fingers, studied it, then tossed it into the pool. They both watched it sink, fluttering, toward the bottom. "I know how hard it is to shake a reputation, Clark."

"So maybe you shouldn't be doing something that would make it even harder."

"Maybe." Lex nodded, as if he were acknowledging the merits of a flawed argument. "My father assumes that public recognition of our...liaison would be damaging to me. I don't agree."

"You don't?" Clark weighed the bag in his palm. "I don't know, Lex, it just seems like people aren't going to be falling all over themselves to shake your hand about this."

"I can't remember the last time anyone shook my hand if they didn't want something from me. It's all a game, Clark. Your family's respected, mine's hated and feared. Whose reputation is really in danger here?"

Wordlessly, Clark held up the bag. Lex looked at it, his lips compressing.

"You're young," he said. "We've all done stupid things, Clark. What's important is that you recognize they're stupid, and stop doing them."

"Yeah?" Clark looked at the bag, then at Lex. "What would you say if I told you I don't even know where I got this stuff?"

"I'd say I'm glad you decided to come home." Lex reached out and took the bag gently out of Clark's hand. "Metropolis isn't Smallville. But I guess you know that."

"I guess so." Clark took a deep breath and squeezed the tile beneath him in his hands. "So what happens now?"

"It might be a good idea," Lex said slowly, frowning at the pool, "for you to go back to the farm for a while."

Clark said nothing. He felt numb, useless, like a plug left out of a socket.

"I need some time to sort through this with my father," Lex went on. "And I think it's probably a good idea for you to talk to your parents. My father can be...determined. If he decides to make trouble, it could be hard on your family."

Clark nodded. He had an image of walking down the long drive to the road, putting out his thumb, and going wherever the wind took him.

"Just for a while," Lex said. Then: "Clark?"

Clark nodded, thinking of the dark, dusty loft.

"Clark," Lex said softly. "Hey. Come on."

"Okay," Clark said, hitching back from the edge of the pool and pulling his legs out of the water. He hadn't brought a towel out--more bad planning. For a guy with magical superpowers, he wasn't doing very well in the world so far.

Lex touched his shoulder, then took hold of his arm and pulled gently. Clark turned and gave him the best smile he could manage. It was a pretty lame smile, he was sure. At least, it didn't seem to make much of an impression on Lex. His eyes didn't stop searching Clark's face, as intent as if he were looking for evidence of betrayal.

"I'll come find you," he said, every word distinct.

Clark nodded. "I know," he said.

I have no idea where to go from here.

 

 

He went home. Back to the Kent family farm, which was empty when he got there. The truck wasn't in the driveway, so he walked back around to the barn and dumped the duffel, then took a desultory look around. There was a stack of hay bales on the floor that clearly needed to be put in the working loft, so he started moving them up. It was dusty, messy work. The late afternoon sunlight turned milky around him, and his eyes and nose itched like crazy.

It was late afternoon when the truck pulled into the drive, gravel snapping beneath its tires. He'd finished the hay and was elbows-deep in the tractor engine, working on the timing. For a moment he stood still, nerving himself up. Then he put down the socket wrench, wiped his hands on a towel, and walked out to stand in the open doorway.

Martha saw him first, and stopped short, her arms full of brown paper grocery bags, her face pale. He tried to smile, then gave up on that and just submitted to the examination. There was something paranormal about the gaze of a mother when she surveyed her wayward, deflowered son. It was like being inside an MRI that was turned up to eleven, and that was really, really disappointed in you. Clark felt his cheeks heat, and fiddled with the towel until she turned and went into the house without a word. There was a knot in his throat. It hurt to swallow.

Jonathan had put his bags back in the truck bed, and was walking over to the barn. Clark backed up until he was leaning against the big barn door, keeping it more or less between them. That seemed to give Jonathan pause; he hesitated, then walked the rest of the way and took a look inside the barn.

"You put the hay up."

Clark nodded, rubbing at the dark grease stains on his hands.

"Working on that timing belt?'

"Yeah." He rubbed at the blush on his cheek, then realized he was getting grease on his face. Terrific. "It's still loose, though."

"It's hard to get at." Jonathan gave the barn a long look, glanced briefly at Clark's oily hands, then turned to go. "So, are you back?"

"I..." I'll come find you. "I don't know."

Jonathan turned back on his heel, his chin cocked, his eyes assessing. Clark forced himself to meet the look. His chest felt like it was caving in on itself. A slow, miserable collapse.

"Dinner at seven," Jonathan said at last, and walked back down to the truck.

 

 

That night, Clark dreamed of a red rock with his name on it. It was under the toolshed, buried in the wet black dirt, and he was digging with his hands to get it out. It kept sinking deeper and before he knew it he was digging through clay, then mud, then wet sand and gravel. He was standing in a pit, one he'd dug with his own hands, staring up at the edge of the world, far above his head. It was night; the sky above the pit was pure black, salted with stars. One star seemed to glow a little brighter, a little whiter, than the others. Home, he thought.

Lex lay on his belly at the edge of the pit, reaching down with one hand, his face taut with the effort.

"I'm stuck," Clark said helplessly, but he jumped for the hand anyway. Their fingertips brushed and he fell back into the mud, then jumped up again. Jumping and jumping, but he couldn't jump quite high enough.

 

 

part 8

He sat at the breakfast table feeling like his whole gigantic alien body was made of lead. His head weighed fifty pounds, his hands were unaccountably huge and clumsy. He knocked his mug half over, caught it before it spilled completely, and mopped at the puddle of coffee in front of him. Martha and Jonathan watched in silence.

"Mr. Lowenstein's extracting today," Martha said at last, with an air of changing a subject that nobody wanted to talk about. "Clark, do you think you could give him a hand?"

"Sure." He folded the wet napkin and dropped it on top of his uneaten toast, then carried the plate to the sink. "Where do I go?"

There was a slight pause, the pause that seemed to follow half of what he said. The pause itself said, Oh God, you don't remember, do you? It was probably just as painful on their side as it was on his.

"The Lowensteins have the property to the east," Martha said quietly. "You can take the road, or you can just walk across the fields."

"Okay." From where he was standing, he could see the driveway. He stood looking at it for a minute, some part of his mind willing a stupidly expensive, low-slung convertible to drive up. He wasn't picky about make or model. Lex had several.

Nothing happened.

"Okay," he said again, and turned to go get his jacket and extract with Mr. Lowenstein, whatever that meant.

 

 

It meant bees, apparently. Clark stood holding the heavy gloves and mesh hat that Mr. Lowenstein had handed him, staring at the half-dozen wooden crates on bricks, the ones with all the bees zipping in and out.

"You'll want that on," Mr. Lowenstein said, nodding at the gloves and hat. Clark looked down at them, looked back at the bees, then put the stuff down on the little folding work table with the smoke cans on it.

"I think I'll be okay."

Mr. Lowenstein paused. Beneath the mesh of his own hat, his eyes were just as tortoise-like, just as aged and unsurprised, as they'd been when he'd driven Clark home in his truck. He looked at Clark's hands, smooth and pale. Sort of out of place on a farm kid, Clark reflected.

"They'll bite ya." He said it in the same tone in which the Delphic oracle might have delivered her pronouncements: with absolute certainty, and without any particular sentiment.

"I'll be okay."

Mr. Lowenstein shrugged and went back to pulling on his gloves. "Some people aren't fussed by it, I guess."

"I guess not." Despite himself, Clark hung back as Mr. Lowenstein waved the smoker over the hive, like a priest waving a censer. He took the smoker when it was handed to him, then watched Mr. Lowenstein lift the top layer of the hive off. The sound of buzzing amplified and changed pitch, clearly expressing indignation rather than studious order.

"Damn," said Mr. Lowenstein conversationally, turning around with the layer in his hands. Inside, it was chock full of wet comb and wriggling bees. "Bit me on the neck."

"Oh..." Unsure what to do with himself, Clark just stood there until Mr. Lowenstein thrust the layer into his hands. It was heavier than he'd expected it to be, and he crushed a bee with his right thumb when he took it. It stung him, a sharp and transitory pain, like a needle prick. "Um, what next?"

"Take it in." Mr. Lowenstein waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the house, then paused and gave Clark a closer look. "In the garage. Put it on the table, then come get the next one."

"Okay."

Lugging the thing into the garage, he was stung again on the tip of his right forefinger, and he got honey on his boots. Irritably, he wondered whether he always got all the scut work, or whether this was just payback for the last week, or maybe for the whole summer. Either way, it was a pain in the neck. As soon as he thought that, he was stung in the side of the throat, as if someone with actual control over his life was listening in, and making a statement.

 

 

"My boy John's in the city," Mr. Lowenstein said, running the hot knife over the tops of the pearly, waxy cells. Clark stood back, watching in fascination. Inside each cell was honey, dark as tea.

"Goes out a bit." The hot knife moved easily over the cells, like a magic wand. "Saw you, a couple of times."

Clark blinked and came back to himself. "He...he did?"

Mr. Lowenstein nodded, his eyes on the knife.

Clark made himself count to twelve. "Did he...I don't remember, did he say hi?"

Mr. Lowenstein shook honey off the knife, and scraped it on the edge of the wooden frame. "I'd say."

What does that mean? Clark asked himself frantically. Who the hell was John Lowenstein, anyway? Without meaning to, he flashed on the guy at the bar in Soleil. Dark, knowing eyes and an expensive suit. Not a farmer's son, right? But what did a farmer's son look like, anyway? Clark was a farmer's son, or at least he played one, and everybody believed it. When he'd stood in front of the mirror that morning, staring at his own lips and eyes and hands and ass, he couldn't make it compute. He looked like...a model. An alien model, a composite of perfect parts. How was anyone fooled?

"Said you didn't call him back," Mr. Lowenstein said, glancing up at Clark from beneath his brows.

"I didn't...I'm sorry. I didn't know I was supposed to."

"It's polite." Mr. Lowenstein picked up the frame and turned to place it in a metal contraption, leaving Clark to belatedly catch his tone and realize that oh God, yes, it was that kind of call back. A morning-after call back. To John Lowenstein, whom he couldn't have picked out of a lineup of two. And yes, he was having this conversation with John's father, a hundred year-old dairy farmer with sun creases in the back of his neck and a checkered handkerchief in the pocket of his bib overalls.

"I'm sorry," Clark said, feeling his face go supernova, and wishing he could drop straight through the floor. Mr. Lowenstein flipped a switch on the contraption and it started to shimmy honey out of the comb. He stood beside it, watching it with a careful eye, until it changed tone. Then he shut it off, picked up a clean glass jar from the table, and held it in the stream of honey still flowing from the chute. Slowly, the jar filled.

"I'm really sorry," Clark said again, scratching the back of his neck where he'd been stung again, and feeling his fingers stick. "To be honest, I really don't know what was going on with me this summer. I kind of...freaked out, I think."

Mr. Lowenstein capped the jar, wiped it with his checkered handkerchief, and held it up to the late afternoon sun. They both looked at the deep golden glow, flecked with wax and bubbles, of the honey.

"Here you go," he said, turning and holding it out negligently, like a tip for a valet. "Take that to your mama, she could use a little sweetness."

 

 

Walking back home along the road, the jar in his hand, his knuckles swollen from stings, smoke in his clothes and all his finger sticking together, Clark thought: I should feel really bad right now. He should feel humiliated and guilty and ashamed and angry. Possibly also scared, since he still didn't know what had made him run all over Metropolis like a big gay Lothario, trampling on people's feelings and taking pills out of sandwich bags. For all he knew, it could happen again. He should feel terrible. But for some strange reason, he didn't. He felt sort of bemused and quiet. His hands itched from beesting. That felt okay, a little bit of payback from the universe, but not so much that it felt unfair.

He heard the convertible's engine purr, low and manicured, almost like the hum of a beehive, stopped, and turned around. It took a minute to come into sight around the curve. Clark stood on the roadside and waited. The sun slid over the hood of the car like honey sliding over glass.

"Hi," said Lex, putting the engine into neutral and smiling up noncommittally from the seat of luxury. "Need a lift?"

Clark briefly considered the fact that he could probably pick the car up with Lex in it and carry it home on his shoulder. Then he dismissed that as irrelevant, and smiled back. "Sure." He reached for the handle, but drew back when he realized the state of his fingers. "I'm kind of a mess, though."

Lex frowned, looking more closely. "What is that?"

"Honey."

"Ah." Lex shrugged and popped the door. "Get in. It needs detailing anyway."

Clark hesitated a moment longer, then got in. The car was so low he had to practically crouch to sit, and his knees cracked against the glove compartment. Lex grimaced.

"I guess I need a bigger car."

"Oh...no, it's okay." Clark dropped the honey in his lap and hugged his knees awkwardly to his chest. He could feel the flush in his cheeks--for some reason, he was a little broadsided by the idea that Lex would consider getting a bigger car just so Clark could have legroom. Of course, Lex probably got new cars to match his socks, so it was all relative. But still. There was an element of ready commitment there that made him want, bizarrely, to apologize.

"Are you okay?" Lex was looking at him a little more closely, hand poised over the gearshift but not moving yet. He smelled faintly of cologne, a sexual tug Clark felt deep in his belly. "I guess I should ask, are your parents okay?"

"They're..." Not speaking to me. "Okay."

Lex kept looking at him. Clark cleared his throat and scratched a stinger out of his thumb.

"You look tired," Lex observed. "And you're covered in honey."

That cracked a smile out of both of them. Clark held up the jar. "Right out of the hive. I think I got stung about a hundred times."

"No kidding." Lex put a hand up and steadied the jar, studying it as if it contained long-lost relics from the ocean floor. "So that's where honey comes from."

"Yeah. It's hell milking the bees."

Lex's fingers shifted; now they were touching Clark's. It wasn't an accidental touch. Lex's forefinger moved gently over Clark's, back and forth, as if like all things Luthor it were considering its next move.

"How's your dad?" Clark asked, hearing the falter in his own voice.

"Angry."

"Oh." Clark nodded, and looked at his knees, pressed against the glove compartment. "I guess this wasn't exactly what he had in mind for you."

Lex pursed his lips. "I think it's more the thwarting. My accounts were unfrozen this morning, and the board's very upset about my father's repeated disregard for its oversight of company finances."

"Oh, right. The...board."

"Trevor Smalls, the current board chair, is a close personal friend of my chief attorney. Apparently he woke my father up at seven o'clock this morning with some choice words about fiscal responsibility."

"Oh." Something more seemed to be called for, so after a minute Clark added, "That's good."

Lex raised an eyebrow, then took his hand back. He pressed the forefinger and thumb together, smiled slightly, then put them to his mouth and licked them. Clark sat fixed to the spot, holding the jar in midair.

"Honey," Lex said, by way of explanation. He had a very pink tongue.

"Oh," Clark said again, faintly. "Right."

They sat there a minute longer, then Lex put his hand back on the gearshift and said equably, "Well, I guess I should drive you home now."

That, Clark realized at last, was the wide-open door of invitation starting to gently close in his face. Hurriedly, without thinking and without any grace, he leaned over the seat and kissed Lex. His knees ground into the glove box and his dick was a hot, heavy weight in his lap. Lex gave a surprised oof, and Clark jerked back just as fast, his cheeks on fire.

"Sorry," he said, reaching for the door handle.

"That's okay," Lex said, blinking a little, one hand rising to his mouth. "I mean, what are you sorry for?"

"I'm kind of..." Clark gestured helplessly at himself, at his huge knees trapped in the footwell, at his stickiness and smokiness and lost summer of insanity. "I'm kind of a mess, Lex."

"It's okay." Lex reached for him again, and Clark leaned back, his hand still on the door handle.

"No, I mean..." Briefly, he consulted with his own lack of judgment. He'd done stuff he didn't remember, to people he didn't know. He might, for all he knew, do it again. With one part of his brain, he remembered the soft, long nights in Lex's bed. The look on Lex's face when he came, the look he got when Clark kissed his knuckles. With another, dingier part of his brain, he thought of John Lowenstein, whoever he was. The guy in Soleil. The pills and condoms and money, the unexplained motorcycle, the fact that he was an alien from another planet. Bad ideas. It was all one big bad idea, from beginning to end.

"I mean," he said, staring at a smear of honey on his knee, "that I did some really crappy stuff this summer. I think. I mean, I know I did. And maybe it doesn't matter to you, but I'm not okay with it."

Lex leaned back against his door, and propped an elbow along the top of it. One hand plucked thoughtfully at his lower lip. It was his Considering Pose, Clark knew. It was also the one he got when he was freaked out and didn't want to show it.

"What kind of stuff?" he asked, his tone neutral.

I have no idea. Clark shrugged, turning the jar around in his hands, watching the honey swell and flow. "It doesn't really matter. Just...I know you think I'm just this super-clean farm kid, but I think I've done some stuff--"

"You think?" Lex broke in, his eyes narrowing. "Or you know?"

"It doesn't matter."

"It does matter. What are you talking about, exactly?" Lex studied him with sharp, foxlike eyes. "Clark, what kind of crimes are we talking about? Did you kill someone?"

Clark felt his eyes go wide with horror. He hadn't even considered that option. "No! I mean, no. Nothing like that, just--" He shook his head, privately wondering whether he'd know if he'd killed someone, or hurt someone badly. That kind of thing stayed with you, didn't it? You couldn't just slough off a murder, the way you could a night of bad sex. Right?

"Just..." Lex left it hanging open, his tone reserved now, his heartbeat barely above a walk. Glancing at him, Clark realized that Lex was used to fixing problems most people would consider insurmountable. He'd been raised to conquer the world, after all. There wasn't a broader set of shoulders around, metaphorically speaking. All at once, Clark felt an almost irresistible urge to spill. Just put his head down and tell Lex everything: I have no idea who I am, I can't remember a thing, I'm an alien, and I want to go home with you and get into bed and never come out. And my knees hurt. He'd felt that urge once before, he remembered. At the time, he'd resisted. Kents didn't trust Luthors. That much, he knew, was true.

"Clark," Lex said softly. "Come on. What is it?"

"I think--" Clark started miserably, scraping honey from the knee of his jeans. I think I'm going crazy. I'm an alien--no, seriously, I am. And I don't know what's wrong with me. And I might be in love with you.

He heard the familiar, throaty growl of the pickup truck well before it came around the bend. Straightening, he glanced back anyway. Lex frowned.

"What?"

"I have to go." He popped the door and slid out, wincing at the feel of stickiness he left on the handle. "I'm sorry, I'm just gonna walk home."

"Clark--" Lex gave him a What's going on? gesture with both hands, then checked the rear view mirror. The truck was just rounding the bend. He frowned.

"I'll come by later," Clark said. "If it's okay, I mean. But you should probably go."

"How did you--?" Lex glanced at Clark, then back into the mirror. The truck was getting nearer, and he shook his head and put the convertible into drive. "Later. Okay. You'll come to the mansion?"

"Yeah." Clark wiped his mouth with his sleeve, not so much because of the kiss as because of what he was sure he'd been about to say. But to Lex, he realized, it probably looked like regret. "I promise, I'll come tonight."

"Okay." Lex took a deep breath, eased off the clutch an inch, then stopped. "Wait, I forgot--" He dug in his pocket, then held something out. "Your ring. The maid found it in the couch cushions."

"My--" Confused, Clark leaned forward to take it. A red stone in an ugly, brassy setting--it looked like a cheap class ring. Was it his? He couldn't imagine it. "Um, thanks."

His fingers closed over it, and Lex half-stood in his seat, stamping on the gas with the clutch in, revving the engine high, and catching him around the back of the neck for a quick, illicit kiss. It was just a second, just long enough for Clark to be startled, to smell Lex's cologne, to register the feeling of warm lips on his. Then Lex jerked back, shaking his hand with a hiss.

"Ow--dammit." He sucked on his finger and they both stared at the dying honeybee that had dropped from the back of Clark's collar, onto the leather passenger seat. Lex gave a rueful laugh and studied his finger. "I should have seen that coming, I guess."

"I'm sorry." Clark stepped back from the road, the ring in his fist. The pickup was close enough now that he could see Jonathan inside, could hear the minute slowing of the engine as Jonathan's foot eased off the gas.

"I'll see you tonight," Lex said, with a meaningful look, then shook his hand one more time, signaled, and pulled out. The convertible rode like a silver fish in a current.

Clark stood where he was, fingering his collar, until the pickup rumbled to a stop in front of him. Jonathan's face was set, his shoulders tight. He'd seen Lex's car, of course.

"Get in," he said.

Clark got in.

 

 

"Your mother and I have decided," Jonathan said, staring straight ahead with one hand on the top of the steering wheel, "that you need to make a choice."

Clark swallowed. "What kind of a choice?"

"You need to decide whether you're still our son." Jonathan gave him a hard sideways glance. Whatever he saw seemed to make him relent a little, because he shifted his grip on the steering wheel and rolled his neck as if it hurt him. "Clark, you can't keep doing this. Your mother...she's at her wit's end."

"I'm sorry." Clark stared out the window at the speeding rows of corn, the spokes lying down in fast sequence. "I really am."

"If you were sorry you wouldn't do it. That was Lex, wasn't it?"

There was no point in lying, even if he'd wanted to. Clark fingered the worn door handle and said nothing.

"You have no idea how dangerous he is," Jonathan went on, slowing for the stop sign outside their farm, even though nobody was around. "Clark, you have to stop...seeing him." The slight pause was all too obvious, worse than an obscene accusation.

Clark fingered the push button lock. They sat in silence for a few seconds, then started again.

"What if I don't want to?" he asked.

"Then you're not our son anymore." Jonathan's voice was either furious or heartbroken. Clark couldn't tell which. "If you choose to go that way, Clark, your mother and I can't help you anymore. You'll be on your own."

The growl of the engine was, on some level, so familiar he felt it in his bones, in the pit of his belly, in his brainstem. On another level, it was just one more thing he didn't remember. Jonathan and Martha were the only parents he'd ever known. The problem was, he didn't know them.

"I understand," he said.

They drove up the driveway in silence, and as soon as they reached the house, before Jonathan had even shut off the engine, Clark opened the door and got out.

 

 

part 9 - the end

He left the honey on the front porch step for Martha, and went to the barn. His duffel was still mostly packed, and he didn't remember any of his stuff, so he didn't mind leaving the rest of it behind. He jammed a few more T-shirts into the bag, then sank down onto the edge of the bed and sat staring into space. He still had money in his leather jacket--a few hundred dollars, at least. The motorcycle was at Lex's place; he could easily go pick it up. Maybe the best thing would be to make up his own third option, strike out in a whole new direction while the striking was good. People had probably done it with less.

Something was jabbing his leg inside his pocket, and he fished uncomfortably until he came up with the ring Lex had given him. Frowning, he turned it in his fingers. It was a seriously ugly piece of work, not at all the kind of thing he'd have expected of himself--except he didn't know himself, so maybe he should hold off on the judgments. Apparently he liked cheap, glittery rocks that looked like high school mementos. It didn't even look big enough to fit on his fingers. For a moment, he considered trying it on, just to see. But his knuckles were still swollen with bee sting, and frankly he really didn't care enough to be bothered, so he tossed it onto the little bedside table, next to the picture of him and Lex and all the other people he didn't know. It skidded and dropped off the back edge, lost to the mice. Briefly, he hoped it wasn't a ruby.

He stood up, yanked the duffel closed, and was about to hoist it onto his shoulder when someone called his name outside. He paused, wondering if he'd imagined it. The barn was silent.

"Clark!" It was Martha, yelling for him, just outside. He dropped the bag and took the stairs at a run, hit the floor, and found himself out in the yard before he could blink. She was standing by the door of the storm cellar, her apron wet with dish suds and her face pale and panicked.

"Clark--oh my God!" She reeled as he grabbed her arms, and he realized he'd been moving too fast to see.

"It's okay, it's me. What's wrong?"

"Your father--he's hurt, he was changing the bulb and he fell--" She pointed down into the open door, her hands wet with dish water, shaking. "He's hurt, Clark. You have to help him!"

"It's okay." He gripped her arms and tried to get her to look him in the face. "Mom, it's okay. Go call 911."

"Clark--" She faced him abruptly, her cheeks tear-streaked. "I'm sorry, honey."

"It's not your fault. It's going to be okay, I'll be right back." He turned for the door. Fleetingly, it passed through his mind that people felt guilt for the strangest things. Things that weren't their fault at all. And that the cellar door was very dark, a black hole into the ground.

He went down the steps carefully, feeling with his feet. "Dad?" It took him a second to realize he could see in the darkness--not normally, but in a weird new way that showed him the heartbeat of every vole and snake behind the walls. Jonathan was lying on the stone floor at the back of the cellar, his bones and veins glowing in the darkness. There was no ladder beside him, Clark noticed. That was strange. There was something else, though. Something big, under a heavy canvas tarp. It hummed with energy that wasn't electrical, pulling all his little hairs upright.

He stopped where he was.

"Dad?"

Jonathan sat up, his expression weary. "I'm sorry, son," he said, and yanked the tarp away.

Beneath it was a hole into another universe, an endless screaming tunnel that nobody could run fast enough to escape.

 

 

Clark came to sitting on the top step leading to the storm cellar, with a cold compress on the back of his neck and both his parents hovering. His head ached with an awful, glassy fragility, as if it was poised to shatter to the touch. His upper lip itched.

"Clark?" His mother's palm on his brow was so gentle, so cool, it felt good. He took a deep breath, and smelled grass, corn, cows, home.

"Put this on your nose," Jonathan said, and something cold and wet was pressed into Clark's hand, and he realized he was bleeding.

 

 

"We couldn't think what else to do," Martha said. "You didn't remember us, and at first we thought it would come back on its own, but it didn't, and you were staying at Lex's place--"

At Lex's place, Clark thought, staring at the living room ceiling. He was sprawled on the couch, his feet and head overlapping the arms, the ice pack still on his forehead. I was staying at Lex's place.

"We thought, even if it didn't go away, if you'd just choose to come back on your own, we could make it work, but you didn't want to. We were afraid you were never going to remember. We thought..." She trailed off, her fingers knotted in front of her, white as roots. "We had to do something, Clark."

"I know." He shifted and smiled at her, a little weakly. "It's okay, I understand."

"The ship..." Jonathan shifted in his chair, his gaze on his coffee cup. "It's a trigger, isn't it?"

Clark thought of the acres of glittering ice, the voice he'd felt deep in his belly. His body had been a wineglass, singing to a careless finger. His father, talking to him. It had been like an audience with God.

"It's..." He swallowed. "I don't know how to describe it."

For some reason that made Jonathan's shoulders rise another inch. He opened his mouth, hesitated, then said, "We wouldn't have done it if we'd thought you'd come back on your own. But when I asked you to choose, you chose..."

They all sat in the ensuing silence.

Lex, Clark thought. Or maybe not. Maybe he'd really been going to throw on his jacket and head out into the wide world, start over somewhere where nobody knew him. He honestly didn't know, but he did know he hadn't been going to stay.

Martha folded the cloth she was holding, tightly and neatly against her lap. "Clark--you remember now, right? You remember who you are."

Clark stared at her for a long moment, trying to think what to say. Then he saw the fear rising in her eyes, and realized there was only one real answer to the question.

"Sure, Mom," he said, touching her hand with his own. "I remember everything now."

 

 

The mansion was eerily, doubly familiar now--he saw it through two sets of eyes. As regular Clark, dutiful scion of the Kent family, raised on home-grown milk and corn, impetuous but innocent farmhand friend of Lex, frequent visitor for sodas and advice. And simultaneously, as the shadowy alter-Clark, a puzzling mixture of regular Clark and some semi-fictional, inexplicable, untrustworthy guy named Kal. Kal-Clark knew what Lex's mouth tasted like, and what Lex looked like when he put on his watch after taking a shower. But Kal-Clark was gone, no forwarding address.

To both sets of eyes, the mansion was big and dark and quiet. It was past midnight, everyone in bed. Except for Lex, asleep on the couch in his study with the light turned on. His mouth slightly open, a glass of whisky half-drunk on the table in front of him. A sheaf of papers spread over the floor.

Clark hesitated, then crouched down beside the couch and studied Lex's sleeping face. It looked the same as he remembered from the nights he'd spent in the bedroom down the hall. Lex was supposed to be the duplicitous, two-faced one, the one you couldn't trust. He was a Luthor, after all. But Clark kept trying to think of moments when Lex had tried to trip him up or exploit him, and he kept coming up blank. It gave him a vague sense of unfairness, and uncertainty. He felt like he'd just reached out and righted an off-kilter, haphazardly spinning world, only to find that when the world stopped spinning, nothing was in its right place anymore.

He glanced at the papers on the floor. Financial reports of some kind--rows and rows of little numbers, pluses and minuses, annotated here and there in Lex's careful handwriting. One sheet was scribbled on more heavily than the others--Clark caught sight of his own name, above a column of figures and some quick addition. Lex shifted, and when Clark looked back, his eyes were open.

They looked at each other. Lex's face was relaxed and open, his eyelids heavy. He didn't seem surprised to find Clark crouching in front of him.

"Hi," he said.

"Hi," Clark said, and blushed. It was automatic and painful. Up until now he hadn't really let himself think about the things he'd done with Lex. But now that they were face to face, exchanging words, he couldn't block them out. He remembered it all perfectly clearly, and the memories generated a disturbing warmth in his thighs and belly.

Lex gave him a sleepy smile, then raised his arm and squinted at his watch. "It's late."

"I couldn't get away." He'd had to wait until after his parents went to bed. One last deception, he'd reasoned--it was better than hurting them. "Sorry."

Lex shrugged, then raised the other arm and stretched, hard enough to raise his torso off the sofa. His shirt was untucked, the cotton wrinkled. He let out a small, unselfconscious groan. Clark swallowed and looked away.

"I, uh..." Now was the time for the conversation they should have had ages ago. The one where he said, I'm sorry, it's not you, it's me, I don't know what I'm doing, I hope we can still be friends. He'd had that conversation with Lana, with Chloe...never in his life would he have believed he'd be having it with Lex. On the way over, he'd spent a few moments wondering whether there was anyone left in his life he hadn't had that conversation with. If there would ever be anyone he wouldn't have to break up with. "Lex, I'm really sorry--"

Lex let his right hand fall out to the side without looking, and caught hold of the neck of Clark's shirt. Clark froze. Lex turned his head to the side and smiled.

"You apologize a lot," he said, and pulled on Clark's shirt.

Now was the time to have that awful conversation again, but somehow instead it folded in on itself and became the time for Clark to lean forward onto the balls of his feet, dumb and submissive, mastered by the gentle tug on his shirt. It was the time for him to feel the sleep heat coming off Lex's body, to smell the instinctual sex smell of his cologne and the whiskey he'd been drinking. The time for him to be split in half by lust, both halves brainless and clumsy and pressing into the kiss.

Lex tasted good. He was, Clark remembered dimly and too late, a very good kisser.

He wasn't sure how he ended up on the couch, straddling Lex's legs, his own hands planted deep in the cushions beside Lex's head, Lex's fingers skimming warm and smooth across his back beneath his shirt. He was supposed to be breaking bad news, but his mouth was engaged. He didn't want to break any kind of news. He wanted to kiss and be kissed, bite the cords of Lex's neck, finger his hipbones, unzip him. He was Clark, only son of Martha and Jonathan Kent, secret emissary from the stars. He knew who he was. And he still wanted this.

"Lex," he said, into the side of Lex's throat. Lex gave a noncommittal hum.

"No, really." Clark tried to order his thoughts. "Lex."

Lex's hands stopped moving across his back.

I can't do this, Clark thought. Just say: I can't do this. I'm sorry. He tried to imagine himself pushing off the couch, getting up, and walking out. Not looking back. It wasn't safe.

After a minute, Lex's thumb started tracing slow circles down Clark's spine again. "I was thinking," he said. His heartbeat was steady and slow, as if they were talking in separate armchairs beside the fire. "You should go to university."

Clark paused.

"You could apply for spring entry," Lex went on. The circles were getting slower and smaller, traveling down Clark's back. "Metropolis U has a decent journalism school. You've got good grades, you'd get in."

"I can't--" Clark shook his head and braced a hand against the arm of the couch to push himself back. Lex lay looking at him, the same heavy-lidded look. "I feel like I'm going crazy."

"You could work part-time. You'd probably get a scholarship. And the rest--" Lex shrugged slightly, and glanced at the papers on the floor, the scribbled column of figures. "We could work something out."

Clark took a deep breath. His face throbbed, as if his heart were beating just beneath the skin of his cheeks. Simultaneously, he felt a hot, impatient pulse below his belt. His body couldn't believe he was having a conversation about university right now. Neither could he.

"I can't go to university," he said firmly. "Not right now, anyway. But that's not the point. I came over here to say..." He stopped, trying to find a way to force the words out.

Lex was watching him patiently, his thumb still circling. While Clark struggled to form the sentence, he moved his hand lower and slipped his fingers beneath the waist of Clark's jeans. His index finger slid into the notch of Clark's ass.

"Oh God," Clark said, his eyes closing without thought.

"Nice," Lex said, in a tone of lazy appreciation. Clark felt his cheeks flame even hotter.

"You came here to say," Lex murmured, "that you've rethought this and it's not a good idea. It's not me, it's you. You're mixed up, you're afraid of hurting me, you're a terrible person. But you hope we can still be friends." His finger stroked Clark's tailbone.

"Uh..." Clark opened one eye. Lex looked sleepy and amused. "Not really. I mean, sort of." Lex's finger traveled lower, and he shut his eyes again, holding very still. "Yes."

"Uh-huh." Lex still didn't sound upset, which was confusing. Maybe it was good--it meant they were friends again, and everything was okay. Except Lex's hand was still down Clark's pants, and that wasn't what friends did.

"Lex?"

"If you really want that," Lex said, "then say the word. We'll stop this, we'll go back to being...friends." In the slight pause, his finger stopped moving and pressed flat against Clark's skin.

They lay in silence. The fire popped.

"You don't--" Clark bit his lip. This was beyond stupid, beyond dangerous. It had been bad enough when he hadn't known who he was; now that he remembered, he couldn't keep doing this. Could he?

He lay there a moment longer, his body strung taut.

"You're having a hard time with this," Lex said. "I'm flattered." There was the faintest hint of withdrawal in his tone, now. The muscles of his chest and stomach weren't as lax as they'd been a moment ago.

Clark squeezed his eyes shut, thought for a split second of his mother, the worry and fear in her face, and sent her a silent apology. I'm sorry. I'll find some way to make this up.

Then he sat back on his heels, reaching back to pull Lex's hand out of his jeans. He wanted this to be emphatic, to make an impression. He had a feeling he'd do better with that if he wasn't being groped.

"I don't want this to be over," he said, speaking fast, so wired at the sound of the words coming out of his mouth that he was practically deaf to them. "I don't want to stop seeing you like this. But I can't just...I need some things from you."

His face still and attentive, his hands hanging loose, Lex waited.

"I need privacy," Clark went on, conscious of how ridiculous that sounded. "I mean, I need some time to myself to sort things through. And I need to know that I can trust you."

"You can trust me," Lex said immediately. There was no guile, no hesitation. His face was wide open, his eyes serious.

"There are things about me..." Clark glanced away, then looked back. "There are some things I might not tell you, and that has to be okay. You can't go digging."

A slight furrow appeared in Lex's brow, but after a pause he nodded. "Everybody has something they want to keep private."

"I have a lot of them."

The furrow deepened. "Okay."

"Lex." Clark took a deep breath and thought of the alien ice palace, the voice booming through his skull. This was not what he'd been sent here for; his father would not approve. "I'm serious. No questions. No poking around behind my back."

Lex said nothing, but after a moment he nodded.

"Okay." Clark rubbed his palms across his face, briefly grabbed his own hair, then let go with a sigh. "Okay."

"I hope," Lex said carefully, "that someday you'll feel like you can trust me more."

"If I do..." Clark had a brief vision of what that revelation might look like: twin eyeholes lasered into the ceiling of Lex's bedroom, a tractor mistakenly lifted in one hand. Himself, blushing and stammering. Lex, frozen in disbelief. It wasn't a pleasant vision. "I don't know if I ever will. You have to be okay with that."

Lex nodded, but it was too easy. The wolf didn't stop hunting just because the deer asked nicely. "I understand."

No you don't, Clark thought, but instead of hopelessness he felt a weird exhilaration, as if he were stepping through a doorway into a wide and busy world. A world that might hurt him in a thousand ways before he was through, but one he couldn't imagine retreating from.

"Okay," he said again, instead. He felt a dopey, giddy smile touch the corners of his mouth. "Okay."

Lex's answering smile was indulgent and sly, the smile of a man who was getting something he wanted. His hands crept back around and settled on Clark's hips, then sank lower.

"Okay," he repeated.

There were still some things that Clark didn't remember, but for now he didn't need to. For now he knew exactly who he was, and what he wanted to do.

The End

Many thanks to moosesal for her generous contribution to Jolie's anti-leukemia fund, and thanks to all who donated and/or have commented on any of the contribution fics along the way. I still have several to write, and I'll be starting on the next one asap. If yours is still hanging fire, I'm sorry. Thank you for your patience.

 

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