Thwarted Persephone

Authoress: Wee-Me

DISCLAIMER: I don't own "Smallville" or any associated characters; I don't even really like the show so sue me not.

Note: Set just after the Davis/Doomsday arc.

Begin

"But when Hades offered Persephone her chance at freedom, to everyone's surprise, Persephone chose to live underground with the dark prince." -Davis Bloome, "Smallville" Episode 8-22

She's letting Jimmy lure her back to a place in life that she doesn't want with things that don't matter. He's saying all these pretty words that don't fit with how things really were and she's going along with it. She's lying and telling him she missed him and how she did it all for some greater good that she didn't care about when she was with Davis. She says the right things so that the status quo can be re-established and she can be the good little sidekick again. It's wrong and she knows it, but it's her place in the world, the only one she's ever had it seems (if she was ever anything else she can hardly remember it).

All her dreams of something more died when Oliver and his merry band brought her back from her escape. If they'd left them alone, let them go, let the taint of all those super-secrets and betrayals for the good of humanity wash off her with every mile they drove away, maybe she could have become herself again. Maybe with some distance she could have let herself love Davis like he deserved and like she wanted. Maybe she could have let him love her without all her reservations. It's too late now, she's back and she can't be herself here. Her heart goes numb when she's Chloe the sidekick, it can't bear the pain of her role and the actions of her so-called friends. She lets go of what she felt for Davis, the whole confusing ball of love and lust and caring, that she can't have when she's just Clark's friend.

She's relieved, in a distant way, when Jimmy's kisses stop and he's bleeding on the outside to match her insides. It surprises her that Davis would bother not to run her through as well, but he's always been a better man than what she's come to expect for herself. She'd rather he just run her through than ask all his questions and finally realize how weak and unworthy she is, for him to realize what Oliver and the others must know to place her so low in their regard. When Davis asks her about loving him she can only say she thought she did, which is part of the truth. The whole truth is that she did think she loved him, or that she could, but Chloe-the-sidekick isn't allowed to have a love like his. She has to put all those hopes and dreams aside for an alien that always leaves her and doesn't know her half as well as Davis despite having known her longer. She's not entirely certain that that Chloe can love anyone like Davis deserves. She can't make the words come to explain that to him and it's probably better he think she's a manipulative liar than know she's only a shadow of the girl he believes her to be.

She hates Jimmy for taking away both her escape in death and the man that deserved a chance to be happy more than anyone she's ever known. She can only hope that death gave him the peace he'd longed for. She never got to hold his hand as he died, but maybe the part of her that he'll take to the grave with him will be enough. All her hopes for a happy future and true love will be buried with him at a small funeral she won't be able to attend because she'll be busy playing the weeping widow. She's keeping this place of death, supposedly a sign of Jimmy's love, to remind herself where dreaming of being better than you are gets girls like her. She'll stay in this place where her dreams died and wait for Clark to need her again. She'll stay, regretting that they didn't run far enough, fast enough to leave it all behind.

End

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This has been bouncing around in my email for a while. No I don't know why Smallville either.

Part of my 2011 13 Posts/Days of Halloween.