Here are my stylistic parodies of Joe Brainard's book I remember. This is the first of many including Lex with a fairly happy life, Lex with a really bad life, Clark's life slash and non slash, Kal's POV, and maybe more. Rated M for language, and graphic depictions of sexual relationships (mostly guy on guy) and some violence. Lots of slash here, and some rape scenes, you have been warned. This chapter is Lex/Lionel and Clark/Lex, but both of them are good relationships.

I remember lying on the couch with my father, doing breathing treatments for my asthma while we both read the Daily Planet.

I remember sitting at the kitchen table listening to my mother talk to my father on the phone. They were fighting, and this was the first time I remember witnessing anything like that.

I remember my father laughing when I told him I wanted to be a fireman when I grew up. He took me to his office the next day, and while it wasn't my first time there it was the first time he allowed me to watch his interactions with who he referred to as associates. The way he talked to people, the respect he got…I thought my father was some kind of a superhero.

I remember two kids knocking me down in the dirt, and kicking and hitting me, taking my inhaler away on the first day of school. I was too scared to tell anyone what happened so I lied and said I fell down the stairs, but Mom knew, and she kept me home for two days, and called the school.

I remember my mother teaching me how to bake a cake, a birthday cake for my father.

I remember Dad carrying me around on his shoulders, like I was a king.

I remember being so bored in school, that I used to get up early, go to dad's library, sneak a book into my backpack, and then I'd sit in class with the book in my lap, reading it instead of coloring in pictures of apples, balloons, or cats, or whatever.

I remember the first time anyone—my parents, my teacher—told me I was different, gifted they said. I don't think I've ever seen my father more proud of me, which is sad really, because I was five at the time and now I'm almost 30.

I remember when my mom first got sick. I remember the sound of the word more than anything. Cancer.

I remember repeating it to myself over and over, cancer, as though it was foreign, alien, impossible. That ammonia stench still makes me want to cry.

I remember the day that bastard reporter came to my school. "Lex, Lex Luthor, can we talk to you? How did you feel about your mother's passing?" You know that old cliché 'it hit me like a ton of bricks?' Well it's true; that's how you feel.

I remember getting drunk a few nights after I came home for the funeral, going to my father's room, nearly breaking the door down. When I saw he was crying too, I tried to hit him, but he hugged me so close I couldn't move. He held me all night long and we cried, and cried, and cried, and then I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I knew the sun was shining in through the window, and I was rubbing my eyes. I felt his body pressing against mine, and for one terrifying second I didn't know where I was or whose stomach my erection was pressing up against.

I remember the feel of his hand on my shoulder, and his lips on my forehead. "Do you understand what's happening there, kiddo?" he asked. It took him a while to figure out what I wanted, and at first he wouldn't. He wasn't going to hurt me, he said. He couldn't do something like that to his own child. I'll never forget the contrasting feel of his soft mouth and scratchy facial hair on my chest, stomach, pelvis, his lips wrapping around my cock. "I love you Lex," he told me a million times, afterwards. Ever since then he always says, I love you, after.

I remember going to clubs just to meet guys, telling them my name was Joey, or Max, or something stupid so they wouldn't know who I really was, so I wouldn't cause a scandal.

I remember smoking a joint with my roommate my first week at Met U. I asked him to fuck me, and he did, but I was the only one people called, "fag," when he told the whole school the next day.

I remember Dad smacking me when I came home the day after that.

I remember him saying, "If you ever do anything this stupid again, I will disinherit you!"

I remember the exact look on my face when he told me I was being sent to Smallville, because we were standing in front of a mirror.

I remember the look on Clark's face when I came to after the accident.

I remember masturbating to his picture everyday. I used to think about having a threesome with him, and my father, and how I used to have to pay my dates when I accidentally called them, Clark, during sex.

I remember our first kiss. Clark was high on red kryptonite, and he just burst into my office, and kissed me, roughly, grinding his crotch against mine, and then suddenly he was gone.

I remember waking up in the wine cellar with Clark leaning over me, gently touching my face. I said I wasn't hurt, but he insisted on carrying me upstairs. He said he'd never done anything with a man before, but it would have been obvious even if he hadn't. We made out for so long I came about three seconds after he got my pants off.

I only remember how big his eyes got when he begged me for forgiveness and told me his secret.

I do remember later the same day, when I fucked him so hard it hurt me. Clark just held my body in his arms, kissing everywhere.

I remember the first time Clark said, "I love you."

I remember the fist time I said it back.

I remember the night he whisked me off to Vegas to get married, and I learned that people really can live happily ever after, even me.

I remember being happy, truly happy, just knowing that the two of us were together.