By Lemur
***
Clark walked down Smallville's main thoroughfare trying to cleanse his mind of a day's worth of school-induced questions. And Pete wasn't helping.
"You know what I was wondering in history class today, man? I was wondering if your species or whatever had, like, Prohibition or anything. Or if they even had alcohol," Pete went on, reminding Clark very much of himself from about a year ago. "Do you ever think about that kind of stuff?"
"I think I'd have an easier time telling you when I don't think about that kind of stuff," Clark answered. If he had to choose one decision as the best one he'd ever made, it would be telling Pete his secret – hands down, no competitors. It had taken some of the edge off all the lies and the deceptions to know that one other person knew outside his family.
On the first night after he'd told Pete, the two of them had sat up in his loft for hours, discussing who should or should not be told. It was refreshing to have someone who'd even discuss it, rather than give him the preemptive "No" his parents always gave him. In the end, though, he and Pete had come to the very same decision.
Chloe had been the hardest because it went against their nature to lie to her, but they both worried that even she wouldn't be able to resist a story this big and even if she never printed a word about it, she would go digging into family histories and wild theories that Clark wasn't sure he wanted to hear. It was best she not know.
Lana and Lex had been easier decisions to make. Lana pushed and prodded Clark to be honest, but he and Pete had resolutely agreed that she shouldn't know. It was odd, but having Pete in on it made lying to the others easier and not just because there was now a second person to help come up with reasonable excuses for him being at the scene of so many crimes. Pete had been hurt by his deception, even if Clark really thought of it as more of an "omission," and so he was able to make informed choices. If he honestly thought it was better the person continue to be lied to, Clark had to believe him. He'd said that it bothered Lana that he kept secrets, but his secret could put her in danger. That was all Clark needed to hear.
On the subject of Lex, Pete was less sympathetic and his decision was made largely on his well-stated stance that "I just don't like the guy." So, telling Lex was made solely his choice and Clark didn't enjoy that. In the end, he'd decided not to tell anyone but Pete. He trusted Lex, but there were too many doubts, too many variables. Every time he even considered telling him, he heard little Ryan's voice in his head telling him to watch out for Lex. There's a lot of darkness he keeps from the world.
Clark prefered to believe in people, but he couldn't entirely ignore the advice of a boy who could read minds. With that tag attached to Lex now, Clark couldn't, in good conscience, give him the sort of power over him that telling him would provide…well, any more power over him. Clark didn't look into it, but he suspected that was a factor as well: Lex already had a great deal of inexplicable power and influence in his life, he didn't really need to give him more. It made him far too vulnerable and if there was anything he didn't need to be around Lex it was more vulnerable.
"So what do you do with all these questions?" Pete asked.
"I just ask them – silently, to myself," he answered pointedly.
Pete laughed. "It doesn't bug you not knowing?" Clark let his look be his answer. "All right, good point. It's not like it couldn't not bother you."
"I don't think Chloe would approve of that sentence."
"Well, I said what I meant," Pete stated resolutely.
"Actually, I don't think you did," he responded. "I think you had too many negatives."
"Oh, that's right," Pete joked. "I forgot that you're junior intrepid reporter now; your five year goal." He teasingly punched Clark on the arm. It might have been his imagination, but it seemed that Pete punched him harder now that he knew he was indestructible.
"Hey, do you have time to grab a cup of coffee before heading home?"
"No, I have to meet my mom at the courthouse and do my chores. I'm already behind on them. Wanna come help, put your super-speed to good use?" Pete grinned.
"Not at all," Clark answered, grinning back. "I have my own to do tonight."
"And you're still going to go have coffee?"
"Sure, if I'm not running late, how can I put my super-speed to good use?"
With a teasing roll of his eyes, Pete laughed. "See you tomorrow, Clark."
"See ya, Pete." Pete turned down a sidestreet, bound for the Smallville Courthouse. He had once jokingly told Clark that the real reason he didn't think they should tell anyone was because it made it less cool for him. Clark had laughed, but he'd also believed it. Pete had been his best friend as long as he could remember. It just made sense that he should be the first to know, the only one to know. He didn't want to take away that bond so quickly.
It also made all his questions feel less stupid knowing that Pete thought of ones just as ridiculous. He'd gotten used to the questions. Now they were only an endless drone in the back of his mind, thoughts never fully-formed, but still understood. They floated through his mind without pause, but he didn't acknowledge them all. He had a life, after all, alien or not.
And heading toward the Talon, he knew he was minutes away from seeing one of the brightest spots in his life. His pace jumped a little in anticipation. He liked knowing that he could go to the Talon with a good ninety percent chance of seeing Lana. Granted, even before they'd ever spoken, he'd memorized her class schedule and knew where to stand to see her coming out of class from a distance, but now they were friends…or something like that.
Friends. Clark thought he used the word too liberally or maybe not liberally enough, he wasn't sure. Was someone really just your friend if she made you nervous? Was she only a friend if you always checked your hair before you saw her?
He'd never done that with Chloe, well, he never used to. But now he knew that Chloe liked him or had liked him, as bizarre as that notion was, so it felt weird to be around her and not make some effort to be attractive. But then it felt weird to make an effort at all because that could be construed as leading her on or encouraging her or whatever – none of which he should be doing, he told himself. He didn't like to think about how many times that debate had sent him into the Torch office with a head of half-combed hair.
So was Lana his friend? Yes and no. He enjoyed her company, he liked her sense of humor and her way of thinking, but always there was this inching. Inching toward something else, towards redefinition and so they were never…settled. That's the part that Clark decided felt strange; they were never settled. Friendships were supposed to be comfortable and – it was like when his mom put the ancient sheets with worn elastic on his bed: he could never get comfortable because the sheets kept shifting.
Plus, their conversations were always strained, not the easy, flighty, "I can say whatever I want because you're not looking for a deeper meaning" exchanges he could share with Pete, the kind he used to share with Chloe. If he told Lana that he'd like to help her at the Talon, evidently what she heard was that he'd like to spend time with her alone, which might have been what he meant, but he didn't like her deciding that for him.
Clark didn't particularly care for subtext, mostly because he was lousy at deciphering it. With Lana, he had to scan everything she said for subtext and clearly, he had missed it a couple hundred times. He hadn't even had a clue about Chloe and apparently she wasn't exactly being covert.
He told himself it was because he couldn't think like a girl. He liked that excuse because it was the manly reason. The real reason was probably because he was a "guy." But even in that term there was a subtlety he didn't quite understand.
Lex could tread those waters, though. Clark had no doubts that Lex could out-subtext any girl in Smallville High. He was a master of it. He could make "Help yourself to a glass of brandy" sound like a death threat and that was just…cool. He and Lex could have entire conversations of pure subtext, not the one-shot accidental subtext from an oblivious farm boy.
Clark felt smarter around Lex, cleverer, which was extremely backwards since he knew scores less. Most of the time, he had to take Lex's word when he cited quotes from Napoleon, Shakespeare or Nietzsche. But he was getting better.
Understanding Lex had taken almost as much research time as accepting his alien origins. He'd gone to the library again and this time checked out a couple of big, lofty books he'd seen on Lex's shelf – he would have borrowed them, but then Lex might have asked him questions and Clark could never dazzle him with his knowledge if he had to ask how to pronounce the titles.
Sadly, the books had proved too lofty and accustomed though he was to his own philosophical and pointless "what if" thoughts, he could not fathom battle tactics, sonnets and recipes for war. Even haiku had made his head feel full of cobwebs and mothballs, like he never used it.
In the end, he had ended up checking out a copy of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations and memorizing a few of the more Lex-like ones in the hopes of one day naming the author of a quote before Lex could tell him. It would be worth the loss of two months of Sunday afternoons just to see the look on Lex's face if he ever managed to do it.
He liked the quick back and forth of their talks, he enjoyed trying to figure out later what Lex had really been saying and if, in fact, he had actually managed to keep up. The subtext felt different with him because it actually was a game as opposed to just feeling like one.
He stepped through the Talon's glass doors and into the familiar surroundings. There, at the counter, was the beautiful and lovely Lana Lang. She smiled and all coherent thought left Clark's mind.
But then he realized that she wasn't smiling at him. No, that flash of ethereal beauty was being wasted on Andrew Simmons, or as Clark was currently thinking of him, "some jerk from school."
"Would it be easier if I came by here?" Andrew was saying, being far more obvious than Clark ever dared.
"That'd be great," Lana answered. "My shift's over at six." Clark stared. If his jaw unhinged, it would have been on the floor.
"Great," the jerk said with a smile. "I'll see you Saturday, then."
As Andrew left, he passed with an innocent "Hi, Clark" and Clark couldn't recall the last time he had disliked the sound of his own name more. And Lana! She had said yes. She'd accepted a date when she belonged…well, no, belonged was too strong a word. Clark knew that he hadn't exactly made his move, but surely there was a way to put a hold on a girl or something, like a down payment.
The minute the thought occurred to him, he knew Chloe would have slapped him for it. And he probably would have deserved it.
"Hey, Lana," he greeted, pasting a casual smile on his face.
"Hi, Clark." She looked up at him and smiled warmly. Suddenly, a slap would have been quite helpful because Clark momentarily forgot his own recently loathed name. No girl in Smallville had a smile like Lana Lang.
"So, uh, you going out with Andrew Simmons?" He tried his best to sound casual, but he didn't think he'd accomplished it. Maybe it was how he phrased the question.
"I am," Lana replied, somewhat coolly. "Is there some reason why I shouldn't?" She locked her eyes on him and he suddenly panicked. He'd just arrived and already they were in subtext zone!
In a flash, he tried to reason it all out. He and Lana almost definitely liked one another, but neither one of them had really done anything about it. And flash-pan misogyny aside, he knew he could not own her, lease her or borrow her. He simply could not stake any claim – or give any reason that wouldn't proclaim his mind to be firmly rooted in the Dark Ages.
"No. No, of course not, Lana," he answered, proud of himself for being so modern. "I was just wondering."
Lana shrugged. "All right then." She grabbed a mug from the counter. "Did you want some coffee?"
***
To be continued, you betcha. In the next chapter, the real slash begins. To all my fellow Lex-enthusiasts, I promise it will be worth your time. See, my feeling is that not even Clark thinks about Lex all the time….even if some of us do. But the next two chapters are almost solid Lex, so be ready.
Thanks to all who've reviewed, and a special thanks to Mary Ellen for keeping me on my toes.
Please, review. You readers are one of the main reasons why I write. I'd love to hear what you'd like to see happen.