"Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better."

-Albert Camus

   Clark lay lost in his dreams, as he slept ignorant of the rest of the world's comings and goings. He'd retreated to the barn a little after breakfast, having showered in a daze and mindlessly changed his clothes. He'd sank down onto the couch even as he felt the heavy lids of his eyes give in to exhaustion. He'd been sleeping for hours now, bathed in the light of the sun cascading through the window, and through the cracks between the wooden beams of the barn, filling the whole place with a warmth and peacefulness.

  He'd picked up his diary before he came, knowing that when the energy to confront all his soaring emotions came, he'd need the mean to express it all within his reach. At least this time he'd had the sense to not leave the thing in plain sight.

 Maybe it was the exhaustion form running all night, from sitting out in the cold; maybe it was the disruption of his sleeping patterns with this midday snooze; or perhaps, it was a mixture of that, and all the incredible new things he was feeling…but, either way, Clark had never had such a strange sleep in all his life.

 The dreams seemed endless, images, sounds, turning in his hours of unconsciousness in a surreal cycle. They were strange, senseless dreams of a tired mind. When he awoke he would have but the vaguest impression of some, but for others, he had a lucid control of them…he not only saw and heard things, but felt the emotions they provoked.

 ….he came  home from school, full of happiness at some elusive news he had, some joy he wanted to share. But his mother and father were already celebrating. Martha  turned to him, smiling, her belly heavy with pregnancy. "Its everything we hoped for" she cried, tears of relief falling down her face…

…he was standing in the Talon, but he was behind the counter, serving a crowd of customers, a crowd so full of people, and yet all of them Chloe, Pete, Lana, Whitney. He gave them their orders wordlessly, and they took them away, to sit in around a table in the centre of the otherwise empty room. When he approached them, they were sitting in pairs, Chloe and Pete, and Lana and Whitney, making eyes at each other and laughing. But as he stood there looking down at them, they all looked disapprovingly at their coffees. Blank gazes. And Pete, with a look of annoyance, and incomprehension.

"This isn't what we ordered Clark." He said slowly.

And all Clark could do was whisper, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

Faces like stone. Then Lana gave her classic prom-queen smile. "C'mon Clark" She said, warmth in her voice. "You must know that'll never be good enough"…

…he was at his locker, every inch of his concentration focused on trying to pull a certain textbook out from under the others. He needed it quickly, he had a class, no, a test, something. But no-one was around, no one was helping. He looked around nervously, before suddenly applying all of his inhuman strength to yanking the book out. He demolished his locker in the process. The noise was too loud, and he heard voices, footsteps approaching. He ran down the corridors and suddenly he was outside, on the road somewhere out amongst the fields. Lex was sitting in his car waiting. "Did you get what you needed?" Lex asked in his relaxed, flirting way.

 "I don't know." Clark found himself saying.

  Lex laughed and nodded down at the book in his hands.

"Are you sure?"

Clark frowned.

 "This isn't what I wanted."

Then Lex was standing beside him, his hand on his shoulder. H e leaned in and whispered conspiratorially.

 "Don't worry Clark. I won't tell..." Then he smiled. "C'mon, you don't want to miss the show." They turned to see the meteors flaming their way through the night sky, but Clark just smiled at how safe he felt…

… he was at school, in a class…but it was being held in the auditorium, because there were so many students – but no-one was working. Everyone was just sitting motionless, staring at their work. Clark looked around him nervously, not understanding. Before him there was only a blank sheet. He turned to Chloe who was sitting at the desk opposite him, and whispered nervously,

 "What am I supposed to do?"

 Chloe grinned, and leaned towards him with a mock sympathetic look

 "Aw, what's the matter Farmboy? Did you lie on the application form?"

Clark frowned in confusion, and a hurried mixture of guilt.

 "What form? I don't know what you mean. Is this some kind of test?"

But Chloe only shook her head.

 "Oh no, this is just your future."

 That seemed to satisfy Clark as an answer, and he turned back to the sheet of paper  in front of him.  But now it had writing on it. A single word in his own handwriting.

' Liar'…

…Red, blue and yellow glows through the window from neon signs and streetlights. There were sounds of the city from outside and he turned in the darkness, feeling the sheets of the bed around him. A feeling of relief at the sight of the figure lying next to him. But Lex was staring back at him in a horror Clark  had only seen on Level Three.

"It's not you." Lex whispered, terrified…

…The office of the Torch, but somehow the far end of it seemed to merge into the seating level of the Beanery. No-one was sitting on the chairs though. But Lana came hurrying up, in her old waitress's uniform, as he worked on the computer, writing an article he couldn't see. Her eyes were bright , eager, happy as she placed a lump of meteor rock triumphantly down onto the desk before him.

 "Can this hurt you?" she asked excitedly.

But Clark felt a pang of regret for all her efforts, and spoke consolingly to her.

 "No, I'm sorry." He gave a supportive smile, as her eyes welled up with tears, "I've kinda moved on now."…

     Clark blinked his eyes slowly, unsure of how long he'd been awake, unsure of what was real as the impressions of those dreams drifted into his waking mind. Fragments of fragments, and glimpses of larger pictures, lost in his increasing consciousness.

  But then the real memories came sifting through. Sitting outside in Lex's car, resisting the urge to kiss him, the things they had said by the river, the risks he had taken…

Wow. This was reality. A shiver of excitement ran through him, at the same time as he was filled with a fluttering sickness at his disbelief of it all. How could something so wonderful be so complicated? Why did this grasping of his dreams bring with it such dreadful choking fears of discovery, of rejection, of his parents his friends, such guilt of having a secret to hide; a true secret, one that would be considered shameful, disgusting, incomprehensible…

 He'd spent so many months struggling with the prospect that he did in fact want what he had now. There had been all that denial of his feelings, and then even as he began to accept them, the cynic, the realist, the dreamer within him had been in constant conflict as to whether there was a chance that this very situation could even be achieved. And after all of that, after all of the mental anguish, here he was. He'd made it all a reality.

 Lex felt the same way. Lex wanted them to be together.

  Those words sounded so beautiful in his mind, that Clark couldn't but help cry with happiness, his fingers running nervously through his hair, as he lay staring up at the ceiling.

~ ~ ~

There was still half a day before he could be with him again.  With the prospect of all those hours apart Clark allowed himself to acknowledge just how much he missed Lex when he wasn't around. It wasn't exactly that he felt empty. He couldn't say that. He didn't need Lex to be complete – after all, he'd survived all but this last year of his life without him.

 No, he didn't feel empty without him.

 But he realised that without Lex, he was still only a mere shadow of all that he could be.

 Of course, it had taken him a long, long while to realise it. Maybe it was because all the changes in his life – the discovery of his new powers, and of all the weird stuff happening in Smallville – had started at the same time that he had met Lex. He'd felt the confusion, the excitement and the fear of his life becoming more fulfilled, more worthwhile, and he'd thought it was only due to his new 'adventures'. Perhaps that was true, for the most part. Certainly in the beginning…But then every time he'd been in Lex's presence, every time they had those brief fleeting conversations amidst whatever new meteor-influenced threat was upon them…every time, he'd felt so wired, like his life was just beginning.

   He just hadn't allowed himself for a long time to admit how much his heart was pounding, to admit just how much he grinned at Lex's attention, or how much, and how easily, they shared their thoughts with each other…Being with Lex had made him feel so much more alive. And whenever things got tough, there Lex would be, breezing in with a wry comment, some advice, barely contained expressions of concern, and that ever supportive hand on his shoulder…

 And now – now that they'd found themselves with the same fears, and the same urges, Clark could finally realised just how much Lex could give, no, had given to his life. He'd awoken him from a lonely sleep of getting through the every day routine, of trying to ignore nagging questions at the back of his mind as he sought something more in his 'infatuation' with Lana. Lex had taught him the sweet ecstasy of hope, the pain of forbidden longing, and now, the nervous excitement of awaiting the next time you can see the one you love.

TBC