Chapter 11: Second Thoughts
Chloe leaned back in her chair, as she took a break from all the researching she had been doing for the past four hours. A slight breeze filled the air, and she was finally starting to relax and that wasn't really a good thing. Every time she tried, she would go back and wonder if she was doing the right thing. Everything that had been consuming her over the past week was really getting to her. After all, Clark was her friend, and what she was doing was anything but. She tried to go back and remember the last time she actually felt like his friend. They used to share everything together and somehow, over the years, they had drifted apart. Now she found that their friendship that she had once cherished has turned into a complete mess. Being the one he only goes to for a favor every now and then, not showing up when she most needed him. Still she sat, wondering how their friendship got to that point in the first place.
Now his time was mostly spent with Lana, Pete, or whatever his excuse was for that particular day. Anytime she needed him there, he wasn't, unless she was in danger. She had to give him that much, but still, in the most important days of her life, he was nowhere to be found, and it hurt.
Tears were beginning to fill her eyes, but she wouldn't allow herself to cry. Not over him.
"Ugh! This is ridiculous." Chloe slammed her books closed and stood up from her desk.
With her hand on her forehead she began to pace her room. Her thoughts overwhelming her, she grabbed her bag and headed out the door, with only one destination in mind.
"I don't care what you have to do, get it done. NOW." Lex hung up the phone in frustration. The more and more he thought his plan was coming together, it usually ended up going in the wrong direction. He knew that if Chloe weren't on board with this whole thing he would never get to where he needed to be. That was his fear. Lex didn't have a lot that he was afraid of, but someone turning their back on him that he cared about was on of those things. He would never admit that to Chloe. He would never let her know that's how he had felt about her. He supposed that he started to have these feelings for her, the ones that you could feel in the pit of your stomach, during those nights they would sit up in his office discussing Clark. Of course they always led away from the topic and onto other conversations. Sometimes they would talk about things that no one else knew, and in a way Lex felt privileged that she would share some intimate details of her life that he only would know. As he sat and thought about it a smile graced his face, and at that moment a knock on his office door.
"Come in." He said patiently. "Well this is a surprise Miss Sullivan. What can I do for you?"
"Sorry to come over so late, I just...well I didn't know where to go, and I honestly don't know who else to talk to about what's going on with me." She had a worried look on her face. One he hasn't seen to often.
He stood up and walked over to the ledge of his desk, and sat on the ledge as she sat down in front of him. She placed her bag on the side of the chair and looked up at him. "Lex, I don't know if I can do this."
"Do what Chloe." He questioned, knowing full well of what she meant.
"This, this whole thing. I know I gave you my word, but the more and more I get into it, the more I think about what I'm doing. Clark is my friend, and while I know he hasn't really acted like it as of late, I can't do this to him." She couldn't look Lex in the eye, knowing that she promised him something she just couldn't bring herself to deliver.
A look of disappointment and anger had come across his face. Somehow he knew that she was still to weak to handle everything that came along with deception.
"I understand Chloe, and quite frankly I was surprised on how long you actually stayed in the game." He circled back around and took out some papers that were in his desk drawer and brought them back around. And as he handed them to her, he gave her a small smirk. "I want to show you something."
She took them slowly from his grasp, and as she went through the pictures a look of shock came over her. "What, what is this."
"I thought you might like to know a bit more about your friend."
"Clark is your friend too Lex, or I thought he was. I never really quite understood why you wanted to know all about him." She kept shuffling through the papers until she came across one that she just couldn't believe. "This is ridiculous, there is no way..."
"That he could do something like that?" Lex finished her sentence. "I couldn't believe it either Chloe. I mean I thought it must be some tricky work of the photographer I hired, but I looked into it further, and it's the real deal."
"No, I just, no it's impossible". She put the photographs back on his desk and grabbed her bag and headed out.
Lex called out after her. "He's been lying to us Chloe, don't you think we deserve to know the truth."
She stopped in mid track, took a deep breath and kept walking.
The picture of Clark lifting up the Kent tractor remaind on Lex's desk. It was obvious to him that his friend was more then he was letting on. He knew Chloe felt the same way, and he wasn't going to give up so easily with her. She'll come back to him, he was certain of it.
to be continued.
