THE HEAT IS ON
The heat was stifling and she had not heard from Lex for two weeks. He was supposed to have arrived last night. Lex promised her that he would call her the moment he was settled back in the mansion so that she would know what time they would meet. Since her father had no idea that they had taken their relationship to the next level, they decided that it would be best to meet at his place. There was no need to give Gabe Sullivan an early heart attack, which he would have if he found his boss and his daughter getting it on right on his living room couch.
Chloe had been looking forward to the first day of school since Lex dropped her off at the Daily Planet office before heading back to Smallville. Today, they were going to tell Clark. They would do it together because they knew that Clark would not believe that they were in love otherwise. After all, for all the boy knew, Chloe was still hung up on him.
Because Lex had not called since he left, Chloe was concerned and hurt. The plans would definitely change. She had been itching to scream to the entire community who looked at her with pity in their eyes (Smallville was a small town) that she had found a man to love who would love her back. When she and Lex were open about their involvement, nobody would shake his head and think that that was the poor girl who was left during prom because her date went after Smallville's favorite princess.
Lex better have a really good explanation for completely ignoring her calls for the last fourteen days.
Seeing Clark talking to Lana, she hesitated. Finally, when the two said goodbye and Lana went her way, Chloe took a deep breath and faced Clark. It had to be done sometime. Clark's longing gaze at Lana made her long even more for Lex, wherever on Earth he dropped off to. "It's good to see some things never change!"
Clark hugged her to him, and Chloe was filled with a warm gooey feeling inside her. As sad as she was with her boyfriend missing in action, she could still appreciate the comforting gesture of a friend. She hugged him back.
His greeting was enthusiastic, but Chloe felt herself halfheartedly responding to Clark. She did not know how to talk to him now, having such a huge secret she wanted to share. From the way he talked though, Chloe detected that Clark was still on the train of thought that they was a romantically charged tension between them that they needed to settle. Eager to have that feeling gone and unable to come out with the truth, she made up some lie about another intern so that she could rush to class.
~~
The fire during Biology was heavensent. At least that was what she thought when the accidental flaring of the projection screen gave them a reason to rush out of the school building where, even though the sun was directly glaring down on them, the air actually circulated.
The students around her were noisy. Chloe only wanted to head home and wait beside the phone for Lex to call and apologize. There was a slight hush in the student body that caused her to turn around and smile. He might have ignored her for the last two weeks, but Lex would never ignore any threat to her safety. He was predictable like that.
The silver car parked haphazardly in front of the school lot and her gorgeous man came rushing up. "I came as soon as I heard!" he exclaimed as he strode towards her. Chloe did not really want Clark to find out this way, but natural is always good. She beamed at the approaching man, only for the smile to fall when he headed towards the new teacher and embrace her.
"Hi!" Lex said to the curvaceous teacher who was now rapidly turning into a bitch in Chloe's eyes.
This was the reason that she had been set aside for the last half month? The feelings of insecurity that she had been fighting against since Victoria Hardwick rose suddenly, almost choking her. Lex had the image of the perfect woman. She had known that all along. Indeed, Lana fit the profile better than Chloe did. Lex wanted slim brunettes who fit the rest of the world's idea of what is beautiful. She was a fool to even think that Lex would forget about all those ideals for plain, blonde Chloe Sullivan.
Chloe turned her eyes away from the sight of Lex embracing Ms Atkins. She rapidly blinked away the moisture in her eyes. She vaguely heard Lex thanking Clark for saving his precious treasure. She wanted to throw up.
Just a few weeks ago, Lex was touching her like that. Chloe still remembered being held so carefully in his arms, like she was the most priceless treasure on Earth. How could it have changed so suddenly? They've been in love for longer than two weeks. This couldn not be serious.
When everyone was asked to go back inside the school, Chloe remained behind in the pretense of waiting for Clark. He remained with Lex, talking. Chloe listened carefully, out of Lex's sight. Maybe Lex would tell Clark that this thing with Ms Atkins is not serious. Maybe Lex met Ms Atkins and the woman just would not take no. Anything would be preferable to what unfolded before her eyes.
Lex handed Clark an envelope that she could not identify until Clark said in surprise, "This is a wedding invitation. For tonight."
Chloe turned around so quickly that she stumbled on the unseen step and cut her knee. She lifted herself up with her hands and staggered inside the building. Outside, Lex asked Clark to be his best man, and she heard every word. She wished she didn't. She leaned back against the school main doors and took deep breaths, the one she knew calmed people down. Apparently, that only worked for those whose hearts weren't as crushed as hers.
~~
When she was a child waiting outside the meeting room in Metropolis for her dad to take her to baseball practice, Chloe Sullivan saw Lex slipping out of Lionel Luthor's office. She had waved him over at her and like the well- trained boy that he was, Lex sat beside their employee's daughter.
"So what are you in for?" he asked her, because none of the other kids of the employees were forced to sit outside a conference unless they did something really awful. Lex was an exception because he was the president's son. He was the only one who was punished by having to hang around even if he didn't do anything wrong.
She raised a golden eyebrow and cocked her head, making blonde bangs fall over her eyes. She blew them away and for one second they floated before settling over her lashes again. Chloe tucked it behind her ear. "I'm not in for anything. I don't get punished because dad thinks it's not a good idea to punish me," she told Lex.
"What makes you so special?" the older boy asked.
Chloe sighed and picked up her knapsack from the floor. She hugged it to her because she needed something to hug when she has to talk about it. "Coz I went through a tomatic experience."
The boy furrowed what was left of his eyebrows. "What's that, Chloe?"
"Well my mom left," she said in the lightest way she could manage it. Lex Luthor was no allowed to pity her.
"You mean traumatic," Lex offered.
"That's what I said," she snapped, waiting for Lex to judge her because she did not have a mom to tell her that tomatic was wrong. Because Lex had a daddy and a mommy plus a nanny, and she only had a daddy and sometimes a babysitter, he knew more stuff than she did.
Lex nodded. "I know how that feels. Even if I push the fire alarm button I won't get spanked," he shared, "because I lost all my hair."
The girl grinned. "That's kind of cool."
He shrugged the comment aside and looked at her oddly. "So why are you dressed like a boy? Are you a boy, Chloe?" he taunted playfully.
Chloe gasped in indignation and smacked Lex on the shoulder. It hurt but Chloe was sure Lex wouldn't cry and get her punished because she's the only one who had the guts to injure him. Boys want to get beaten up sometimes. "I am not a boy. I'm dressed in my uniform for baseball practice."
"Baseball!" Lex exclaimed. "You're not only a boy; you're also so bourgeois!"
There he went again using words that she didn't know because she just had one parent! Chloe ignored that and focused on what she did understand. "Girls play baseball too. You're such a loser because you don't get out much."
"I've been to more countries that you know the name of," Lex snorted, because she hit right on the mark.
"I'll show you." She unzipped her backpack and took out her "reporter's notebook." That was where she wrote down anything that interested her. She even wrote down her observations about how cute baldy Lex was. But she wouldn't show that page to him. Instead, she handed him the drawing she did of a dress. "That's my dream gown. I'm gonna get a gown like that when I can buy it. And gowns are for girls. I'm a girl!" she concluded logically.
She found Lex Luthor looking at the drawing closely. He did not insult it like she expected. "What color will this be?"
"White," she answered proudly, "because princesses wear white."
"You're not just any princess, Chloe," he responded. Chloe blushed. "You should have more colors because you're more than just bland white. Maybe some lavender. I like lavender. Because I like you sometimes I think lavender will be pretty on you." He was the only boy his age who had a pen readily available in his pocket. Lex took it out and indicated the parts of the gown that would benefit from the shade. He handed it back to her and added, "You could have some yellow added in because it's like your hair."
The muffled sounds and low voices from inside the room told them that the meeting was over. Lex stood up from his chair and smiled at her before slipping back into his father's office.
The product of their short conversation then turned into reality only on the day she arrived in Metropolis for her internship. She wanted to cry at the fact that he remembered exactly how she wanted the gown to look like. The beautiful dress was waiting for her on her bed the evening she returned. It had a note clipped on it which said, 'We're going to an associate's garden party next month.'
They never did go. The problems with the newly established LexCorp kept them both too busy to attend the party. She told him that it was better that way. Attending a party together, even without anyone from Smallville present, would reveal their involvement to the people they should have informed in the first place. Pictures in society pages notwithstanding, Gabe Sullivan would learn of it from one of the people he would have to talk to in the course of his job. The dress stayed inside the box unused, only seeing the light of day when Gabe informed Chloe that they needed to go to Lex's wedding.
She did not know when she started hating herself so much that she wanted to cause herself as much pain as she could. She slipped on the gown, crying the entire time she did so as she watched the taffeta fall into place. Chloe tied the yellow belt around it and studied her reflection in the mirror, encased in the white silk, lavender chiffon and yellow satin confection that she and Lex whipped up once upon a time.
Chloe had hoped that her appearance on his wedding day would at least trigger some sort of response from Lex. She could not have been that unimportant that she did not deserve a simple explanation. After everything that happened between them, Chloe felt she deserved even a simple, "It didn't work out. Too bad. C'est la vie!" When Lex's eyes merely passed over her figure as he scanned the crowd, she plucked a few orchids the exact same shade the lavender of her gown and threaded them in her hair. Pain is pain so being just a pinch more masochistic wouldn't matter.
Just like a bloodhound with a knack for detecting blood, Clark appeared beside her and forcibly opened the wound by forcing her to talk about things she would have rather forgotten. "Only Lex Luthor could put together a fairly tale wedding in less than forty eight hours," she commented to lighten the mood. It was the wrong thing to say. Despite telling herself she was facing the reality of what Lex was doing right now, when it came down to it, she really was in denial.
"Is something wrong, Chloe?" Clark prodded when he noticed the shift in her mood.
She did not know how, when inside she was being torn apart, but Chloe managed to assure Clark that nothing was wrong anymore. For emphasis, she made a joke. It only hurt her, so it didn't matter. "But I still don't know how I feel about taking sex-ed from Mrs. Luthor. I can't believe Lex is married!" Mentally, she added an Oscar on top of her dresser.
"He says he really loves her."
"Yeah, well love is rarely if ever logical." How many times had Lex told her he loved her? Screw him. He could forget so easily and not even say sorry. Dammit, she had believed him too. Chloe excused herself before she broke down into tears right then. She stopped in front of the punch bowl and dunked her cup in. Who would have thought she would still hear snatches of voices she did not need to hear right then?
"Believe me, when I left I had no intention of falling in love."
Chloe sipped her drink and closed her eyes. 'Of course you didn't, you idiot! We had a commitment!'
"Actually, she said she'd come to save me."
'Oh please.' Chloe's mind was filled with the image of the indoor pool in the mansion. She pictured herself holding the treacherous Lex Luthor underwater. 'Then she would really need to save you.'
"You can waste your time playing it safe, or you can go for it. But at some point, Clark...you just know when something's right."
She tossed her empty cup onto the table, not even minding if it broke. Lex could afford it. She wanted to walk over there, slap Lex right across the face, hard enough to break the skin because that was only a fraction of how much he hurt her. And then, while he clutches his bleeding wound, she would scream at him that they went for it and they were right!
Chloe swallowed heavily and ran towards her father, choking out that she had to leave. Gabe saw the state her daughter was in, and mistook it for her problems with Clark. After all, the Kent boy was the last person she spoke with. He led her off to their car for the drive home.
~~
Chloe told herself that she would forget Lex Luthor. She would remove him completely from her life. She was doing well before he came driving into Smallville and almost killing her very best friend. From then on, Lex Luthor was no one but the man who was sent here to oversee the plant.
She even had a mantra. "I do not care what happens to Lex Luthor. I do not care what happens to Lex Luthor. I have no feelings whatsoever for Lex Luthor. He can go to hell for all I care."
And then Clark Kent came into the Torch office asking for help regarding Desiree Atkins. The research rekindled the concern for the man she cared deeply for. Maybe Lex was being used. A meteor freak had him in her hyped up pheromone induced control. Was it so bad to be ideal enough to believe that if Lex really loved her, he would have resisted Desiree Atkins? She may appear cynical at times, but deep down, Chloe still believed that love conquered all. Why didn't theirs do that?
Through her short message recording session in the Talon for Lana's video mail to Whitney, Chloe mind churned with doubts. Did this mean that the foundations of what she shared with Lex Luthor were so weak that one threat would send their entire relationship crumbling down?
Both she and Lana turned to see Lex, still just a little sweaty from being in this temperature, stride towards them like an avenging angel. Chloe sat up just a little straighter in a futile move to shield herself from pain. One small part of her wanted a miracle, where Lex would see her and then he would fall down onto his knees and beg her forgiveness for everything he had put her through.
"Lana. We need to talk."
He did not even so much as spare her a glance. Chloe swallowed heavily and slipped out of her chair quickly before she either burst into tears right there or tear him apart with her nails. "Umm...I ...have to get some work done at the Torch." Chloe hurried away. When she pushed the door open, she looked back once. Lex never even turned to see her off.
~~
The first time his eyesight cleared, when the haze that had been lurking around his vision vanished, he was hitting the floor with such a force that jarred all his bones. Gunshots exploded above him. For a moment, his recollection of what had happened was a blank. The last thing he remembered was sitting at the back of his limousine, telling Chloe on the phone that he was leaving for his business trip. Now he was down on all fours, being shot at, and an image of Chloe wearing her garden party dress flashed before his eyes. Her eyes were so sad, and it looked like someone had made her cry.
Lex rolled over and saw Jonathan Kent standing over him with a shotgun aimed at his chest. Suddenly, everything came rushing back to him. More than the terror of death, horror filled him at the knowledge that it was he who caused Chloe to be so sad. He shielded himself with his arms, a vain attempt at protection.
The scuffle that ensued after that was a blur to him. All he registered was that Clark saved his life again.
On his visit to Clark's fortress that same night, Lex answered his friend's questions with a heavy heart. It appeared as though he had spent the last few days expressing his 'love' for Desiree Atkins in public. There was no way Chloe could not have known. Even now, no matter how much he prayed that the images in his brain, of Chloe looking so defeated and so broken, were not real, he knew that they were.
He had told Clark the truth. Under Desiree's spell, he had thought that he was in love with her. When he left the Kent Farm, he headed directly to the Sullivan's house. Lex turned off the engine and made his way to the front door. He waited for the door to open.
"Gabe," he greeted. "Hi."
"Lex?" the older man said. "What are you doing here so late? I heard what happened from Jonathan Kent. You should be at home resting."
"Can I talk to Chloe first?"
Gabe smiled at Lex. "You need some perspective then?"
Chloe's father, having known about the friendship between her daughter and the Luthor heir, had recognized a long time ago that Chloe served to ground the young man. Lex nodded, hoping that it would be enough for him to be allowed into the house so he could see how Chloe was doing. They were supposed to tell Gabe and Clark about the new development in their relationship yesterday. Now he wasn't sure if there was anything left to tell.
"Head home, Lex. You can talk to Chloe tomorrow. She's locked herself up in her room. She's got a broken heart." Gabe smiled sadly, the way only a father who sympathized with a daughter's pain would. "I've told her so many times. Clark will realize that they belong together. But she can't rush something like that. Chloe is a girl that men grow into."
"She is. Tell her that, Gabe. She's worth more of the girls that the stupid men in this town go after put together. Tell her." Lex walked back to his car. He looked up at Chloe's window. Her lights were turned off and the drapes were closed.
The heat was stifling and she had not heard from Lex for two weeks. He was supposed to have arrived last night. Lex promised her that he would call her the moment he was settled back in the mansion so that she would know what time they would meet. Since her father had no idea that they had taken their relationship to the next level, they decided that it would be best to meet at his place. There was no need to give Gabe Sullivan an early heart attack, which he would have if he found his boss and his daughter getting it on right on his living room couch.
Chloe had been looking forward to the first day of school since Lex dropped her off at the Daily Planet office before heading back to Smallville. Today, they were going to tell Clark. They would do it together because they knew that Clark would not believe that they were in love otherwise. After all, for all the boy knew, Chloe was still hung up on him.
Because Lex had not called since he left, Chloe was concerned and hurt. The plans would definitely change. She had been itching to scream to the entire community who looked at her with pity in their eyes (Smallville was a small town) that she had found a man to love who would love her back. When she and Lex were open about their involvement, nobody would shake his head and think that that was the poor girl who was left during prom because her date went after Smallville's favorite princess.
Lex better have a really good explanation for completely ignoring her calls for the last fourteen days.
Seeing Clark talking to Lana, she hesitated. Finally, when the two said goodbye and Lana went her way, Chloe took a deep breath and faced Clark. It had to be done sometime. Clark's longing gaze at Lana made her long even more for Lex, wherever on Earth he dropped off to. "It's good to see some things never change!"
Clark hugged her to him, and Chloe was filled with a warm gooey feeling inside her. As sad as she was with her boyfriend missing in action, she could still appreciate the comforting gesture of a friend. She hugged him back.
His greeting was enthusiastic, but Chloe felt herself halfheartedly responding to Clark. She did not know how to talk to him now, having such a huge secret she wanted to share. From the way he talked though, Chloe detected that Clark was still on the train of thought that they was a romantically charged tension between them that they needed to settle. Eager to have that feeling gone and unable to come out with the truth, she made up some lie about another intern so that she could rush to class.
~~
The fire during Biology was heavensent. At least that was what she thought when the accidental flaring of the projection screen gave them a reason to rush out of the school building where, even though the sun was directly glaring down on them, the air actually circulated.
The students around her were noisy. Chloe only wanted to head home and wait beside the phone for Lex to call and apologize. There was a slight hush in the student body that caused her to turn around and smile. He might have ignored her for the last two weeks, but Lex would never ignore any threat to her safety. He was predictable like that.
The silver car parked haphazardly in front of the school lot and her gorgeous man came rushing up. "I came as soon as I heard!" he exclaimed as he strode towards her. Chloe did not really want Clark to find out this way, but natural is always good. She beamed at the approaching man, only for the smile to fall when he headed towards the new teacher and embrace her.
"Hi!" Lex said to the curvaceous teacher who was now rapidly turning into a bitch in Chloe's eyes.
This was the reason that she had been set aside for the last half month? The feelings of insecurity that she had been fighting against since Victoria Hardwick rose suddenly, almost choking her. Lex had the image of the perfect woman. She had known that all along. Indeed, Lana fit the profile better than Chloe did. Lex wanted slim brunettes who fit the rest of the world's idea of what is beautiful. She was a fool to even think that Lex would forget about all those ideals for plain, blonde Chloe Sullivan.
Chloe turned her eyes away from the sight of Lex embracing Ms Atkins. She rapidly blinked away the moisture in her eyes. She vaguely heard Lex thanking Clark for saving his precious treasure. She wanted to throw up.
Just a few weeks ago, Lex was touching her like that. Chloe still remembered being held so carefully in his arms, like she was the most priceless treasure on Earth. How could it have changed so suddenly? They've been in love for longer than two weeks. This couldn not be serious.
When everyone was asked to go back inside the school, Chloe remained behind in the pretense of waiting for Clark. He remained with Lex, talking. Chloe listened carefully, out of Lex's sight. Maybe Lex would tell Clark that this thing with Ms Atkins is not serious. Maybe Lex met Ms Atkins and the woman just would not take no. Anything would be preferable to what unfolded before her eyes.
Lex handed Clark an envelope that she could not identify until Clark said in surprise, "This is a wedding invitation. For tonight."
Chloe turned around so quickly that she stumbled on the unseen step and cut her knee. She lifted herself up with her hands and staggered inside the building. Outside, Lex asked Clark to be his best man, and she heard every word. She wished she didn't. She leaned back against the school main doors and took deep breaths, the one she knew calmed people down. Apparently, that only worked for those whose hearts weren't as crushed as hers.
~~
When she was a child waiting outside the meeting room in Metropolis for her dad to take her to baseball practice, Chloe Sullivan saw Lex slipping out of Lionel Luthor's office. She had waved him over at her and like the well- trained boy that he was, Lex sat beside their employee's daughter.
"So what are you in for?" he asked her, because none of the other kids of the employees were forced to sit outside a conference unless they did something really awful. Lex was an exception because he was the president's son. He was the only one who was punished by having to hang around even if he didn't do anything wrong.
She raised a golden eyebrow and cocked her head, making blonde bangs fall over her eyes. She blew them away and for one second they floated before settling over her lashes again. Chloe tucked it behind her ear. "I'm not in for anything. I don't get punished because dad thinks it's not a good idea to punish me," she told Lex.
"What makes you so special?" the older boy asked.
Chloe sighed and picked up her knapsack from the floor. She hugged it to her because she needed something to hug when she has to talk about it. "Coz I went through a tomatic experience."
The boy furrowed what was left of his eyebrows. "What's that, Chloe?"
"Well my mom left," she said in the lightest way she could manage it. Lex Luthor was no allowed to pity her.
"You mean traumatic," Lex offered.
"That's what I said," she snapped, waiting for Lex to judge her because she did not have a mom to tell her that tomatic was wrong. Because Lex had a daddy and a mommy plus a nanny, and she only had a daddy and sometimes a babysitter, he knew more stuff than she did.
Lex nodded. "I know how that feels. Even if I push the fire alarm button I won't get spanked," he shared, "because I lost all my hair."
The girl grinned. "That's kind of cool."
He shrugged the comment aside and looked at her oddly. "So why are you dressed like a boy? Are you a boy, Chloe?" he taunted playfully.
Chloe gasped in indignation and smacked Lex on the shoulder. It hurt but Chloe was sure Lex wouldn't cry and get her punished because she's the only one who had the guts to injure him. Boys want to get beaten up sometimes. "I am not a boy. I'm dressed in my uniform for baseball practice."
"Baseball!" Lex exclaimed. "You're not only a boy; you're also so bourgeois!"
There he went again using words that she didn't know because she just had one parent! Chloe ignored that and focused on what she did understand. "Girls play baseball too. You're such a loser because you don't get out much."
"I've been to more countries that you know the name of," Lex snorted, because she hit right on the mark.
"I'll show you." She unzipped her backpack and took out her "reporter's notebook." That was where she wrote down anything that interested her. She even wrote down her observations about how cute baldy Lex was. But she wouldn't show that page to him. Instead, she handed him the drawing she did of a dress. "That's my dream gown. I'm gonna get a gown like that when I can buy it. And gowns are for girls. I'm a girl!" she concluded logically.
She found Lex Luthor looking at the drawing closely. He did not insult it like she expected. "What color will this be?"
"White," she answered proudly, "because princesses wear white."
"You're not just any princess, Chloe," he responded. Chloe blushed. "You should have more colors because you're more than just bland white. Maybe some lavender. I like lavender. Because I like you sometimes I think lavender will be pretty on you." He was the only boy his age who had a pen readily available in his pocket. Lex took it out and indicated the parts of the gown that would benefit from the shade. He handed it back to her and added, "You could have some yellow added in because it's like your hair."
The muffled sounds and low voices from inside the room told them that the meeting was over. Lex stood up from his chair and smiled at her before slipping back into his father's office.
The product of their short conversation then turned into reality only on the day she arrived in Metropolis for her internship. She wanted to cry at the fact that he remembered exactly how she wanted the gown to look like. The beautiful dress was waiting for her on her bed the evening she returned. It had a note clipped on it which said, 'We're going to an associate's garden party next month.'
They never did go. The problems with the newly established LexCorp kept them both too busy to attend the party. She told him that it was better that way. Attending a party together, even without anyone from Smallville present, would reveal their involvement to the people they should have informed in the first place. Pictures in society pages notwithstanding, Gabe Sullivan would learn of it from one of the people he would have to talk to in the course of his job. The dress stayed inside the box unused, only seeing the light of day when Gabe informed Chloe that they needed to go to Lex's wedding.
She did not know when she started hating herself so much that she wanted to cause herself as much pain as she could. She slipped on the gown, crying the entire time she did so as she watched the taffeta fall into place. Chloe tied the yellow belt around it and studied her reflection in the mirror, encased in the white silk, lavender chiffon and yellow satin confection that she and Lex whipped up once upon a time.
Chloe had hoped that her appearance on his wedding day would at least trigger some sort of response from Lex. She could not have been that unimportant that she did not deserve a simple explanation. After everything that happened between them, Chloe felt she deserved even a simple, "It didn't work out. Too bad. C'est la vie!" When Lex's eyes merely passed over her figure as he scanned the crowd, she plucked a few orchids the exact same shade the lavender of her gown and threaded them in her hair. Pain is pain so being just a pinch more masochistic wouldn't matter.
Just like a bloodhound with a knack for detecting blood, Clark appeared beside her and forcibly opened the wound by forcing her to talk about things she would have rather forgotten. "Only Lex Luthor could put together a fairly tale wedding in less than forty eight hours," she commented to lighten the mood. It was the wrong thing to say. Despite telling herself she was facing the reality of what Lex was doing right now, when it came down to it, she really was in denial.
"Is something wrong, Chloe?" Clark prodded when he noticed the shift in her mood.
She did not know how, when inside she was being torn apart, but Chloe managed to assure Clark that nothing was wrong anymore. For emphasis, she made a joke. It only hurt her, so it didn't matter. "But I still don't know how I feel about taking sex-ed from Mrs. Luthor. I can't believe Lex is married!" Mentally, she added an Oscar on top of her dresser.
"He says he really loves her."
"Yeah, well love is rarely if ever logical." How many times had Lex told her he loved her? Screw him. He could forget so easily and not even say sorry. Dammit, she had believed him too. Chloe excused herself before she broke down into tears right then. She stopped in front of the punch bowl and dunked her cup in. Who would have thought she would still hear snatches of voices she did not need to hear right then?
"Believe me, when I left I had no intention of falling in love."
Chloe sipped her drink and closed her eyes. 'Of course you didn't, you idiot! We had a commitment!'
"Actually, she said she'd come to save me."
'Oh please.' Chloe's mind was filled with the image of the indoor pool in the mansion. She pictured herself holding the treacherous Lex Luthor underwater. 'Then she would really need to save you.'
"You can waste your time playing it safe, or you can go for it. But at some point, Clark...you just know when something's right."
She tossed her empty cup onto the table, not even minding if it broke. Lex could afford it. She wanted to walk over there, slap Lex right across the face, hard enough to break the skin because that was only a fraction of how much he hurt her. And then, while he clutches his bleeding wound, she would scream at him that they went for it and they were right!
Chloe swallowed heavily and ran towards her father, choking out that she had to leave. Gabe saw the state her daughter was in, and mistook it for her problems with Clark. After all, the Kent boy was the last person she spoke with. He led her off to their car for the drive home.
~~
Chloe told herself that she would forget Lex Luthor. She would remove him completely from her life. She was doing well before he came driving into Smallville and almost killing her very best friend. From then on, Lex Luthor was no one but the man who was sent here to oversee the plant.
She even had a mantra. "I do not care what happens to Lex Luthor. I do not care what happens to Lex Luthor. I have no feelings whatsoever for Lex Luthor. He can go to hell for all I care."
And then Clark Kent came into the Torch office asking for help regarding Desiree Atkins. The research rekindled the concern for the man she cared deeply for. Maybe Lex was being used. A meteor freak had him in her hyped up pheromone induced control. Was it so bad to be ideal enough to believe that if Lex really loved her, he would have resisted Desiree Atkins? She may appear cynical at times, but deep down, Chloe still believed that love conquered all. Why didn't theirs do that?
Through her short message recording session in the Talon for Lana's video mail to Whitney, Chloe mind churned with doubts. Did this mean that the foundations of what she shared with Lex Luthor were so weak that one threat would send their entire relationship crumbling down?
Both she and Lana turned to see Lex, still just a little sweaty from being in this temperature, stride towards them like an avenging angel. Chloe sat up just a little straighter in a futile move to shield herself from pain. One small part of her wanted a miracle, where Lex would see her and then he would fall down onto his knees and beg her forgiveness for everything he had put her through.
"Lana. We need to talk."
He did not even so much as spare her a glance. Chloe swallowed heavily and slipped out of her chair quickly before she either burst into tears right there or tear him apart with her nails. "Umm...I ...have to get some work done at the Torch." Chloe hurried away. When she pushed the door open, she looked back once. Lex never even turned to see her off.
~~
The first time his eyesight cleared, when the haze that had been lurking around his vision vanished, he was hitting the floor with such a force that jarred all his bones. Gunshots exploded above him. For a moment, his recollection of what had happened was a blank. The last thing he remembered was sitting at the back of his limousine, telling Chloe on the phone that he was leaving for his business trip. Now he was down on all fours, being shot at, and an image of Chloe wearing her garden party dress flashed before his eyes. Her eyes were so sad, and it looked like someone had made her cry.
Lex rolled over and saw Jonathan Kent standing over him with a shotgun aimed at his chest. Suddenly, everything came rushing back to him. More than the terror of death, horror filled him at the knowledge that it was he who caused Chloe to be so sad. He shielded himself with his arms, a vain attempt at protection.
The scuffle that ensued after that was a blur to him. All he registered was that Clark saved his life again.
On his visit to Clark's fortress that same night, Lex answered his friend's questions with a heavy heart. It appeared as though he had spent the last few days expressing his 'love' for Desiree Atkins in public. There was no way Chloe could not have known. Even now, no matter how much he prayed that the images in his brain, of Chloe looking so defeated and so broken, were not real, he knew that they were.
He had told Clark the truth. Under Desiree's spell, he had thought that he was in love with her. When he left the Kent Farm, he headed directly to the Sullivan's house. Lex turned off the engine and made his way to the front door. He waited for the door to open.
"Gabe," he greeted. "Hi."
"Lex?" the older man said. "What are you doing here so late? I heard what happened from Jonathan Kent. You should be at home resting."
"Can I talk to Chloe first?"
Gabe smiled at Lex. "You need some perspective then?"
Chloe's father, having known about the friendship between her daughter and the Luthor heir, had recognized a long time ago that Chloe served to ground the young man. Lex nodded, hoping that it would be enough for him to be allowed into the house so he could see how Chloe was doing. They were supposed to tell Gabe and Clark about the new development in their relationship yesterday. Now he wasn't sure if there was anything left to tell.
"Head home, Lex. You can talk to Chloe tomorrow. She's locked herself up in her room. She's got a broken heart." Gabe smiled sadly, the way only a father who sympathized with a daughter's pain would. "I've told her so many times. Clark will realize that they belong together. But she can't rush something like that. Chloe is a girl that men grow into."
"She is. Tell her that, Gabe. She's worth more of the girls that the stupid men in this town go after put together. Tell her." Lex walked back to his car. He looked up at Chloe's window. Her lights were turned off and the drapes were closed.