Clark found himself waking, as he usually did, to the gentle sound of birds chirping. It wasn't the sound coming from outside his window; rather, it came from his "natural sounds" alarm clock that Clark considered one of the smartest investments he'd made for college. The clock also gently increased the light in the room too, so Clark usually ended up – true to his country roots – waking fifteen minutes before the actual alarm went off. The morning ran as usual: wake up at 6:45, take a shower in the bathroom he shared with his suitemate – who never rose before eight o'clock - eat a nice breakfast of OJ, Froot Loops and whatever fresh fruit happened to be in season for that time of year, before heading off to classes. Clark's patterns tended to contrast with those of his roommate in such a way that he rarely saw the other guy; he woke late, did most of his work in the library, and only seemed to use their room as a place to crash between the hours of 2 and 8 am. Though he hadn't seen much of him – he could barely remember his last name – he already felt like he knew more than enough about him. He tended to stay out drinking vodka or rum, and even once tequila, judging by the odors Clark's nose picked up when he walked into the kitchenette in the morning. He was fairly promiscuous, but didn't seem to have any single girlfriend; it had only been three weeks since classes started, and already Clark had smelled the distinct odors from four different women.
And a man.
He knew that the guy had a tendency to snore when he slept on his left side, that he had a right ear which tended to produce drier earwax, that his sweat glands clogged easily after working out, and that he wore contact lenses.
I really know too much about the guy, considering I can't even get his name right. Brad…Sanderson? Saunderson? Saunderton? Christ. He glanced down next to his hand on the counter, where his roommate's most recent copy of Maxim magazine lay sprawled where it had been left the night before. Saunderson. I was right the first time. Clark took a mental snapshot of the address label on it so he wouldn't forget the name again before reaching for his cereal from the shelf.
As he sat down to eat, Clark turned on the radio to listen in to the news – not too loud, so that he didn't wake his roommate. Clark hated being woken up in the middle of the night when he was asleep, and he figured he owed the other fellow at least the same courtesy.
"In local news, Governor Eliot Spitzer's daughter Eileen is recuperating at Beth Israel after her miraculous escape from capture by the Russian mob last night. Police say they are unclear as to how the girl escaped from her captors. Police Commissioner Rucka announced this morning that those immediately responsible for the kidnapping are currently in police custody after a raid on the brothel where the girl was being kept. It's 7:50, and you're listening to WNYC – New York's public rad—"
Clark clicked off the radio with a silent curse as he shoveled a couple massive spoonfuls of Loops into his mouth, downed the last of his OJ and dropped the dishes into the sink. No time to do them now; he'd have to do them later, and hope his roommate would understand. He shoved his books into his old red backpack and started for the door – only to turn back and dash into his room. From his nightstand, he scooped up his pair of wire-rimmed eyeglasses and slid them over his face, blinking as he did so. They didn't change how he saw the world; the glass was just there to make them look authentic, not bend the light going into his eyes. Nevertheless, he knew they were essential. He needed a track record of wearing glasses if he ever wanted to use that costume hidden in his room, so he'd started wearing them upon his arrival in Manhattan. He glanced at himself in his bedroom mirror, smoothing a couple wrinkles out of his red shirt. Not too shabby, he thought before a bit of blood rushed to his cheeks in his moment of immodesty. But he didn't have time to stand around and blush; he glanced at the clock and headed for the door.
----------------------------------------------------------It was a beautiful day in the Big Apple, the fourth one in a row. On the NYU campus, Abercrombie t-shirts and American Eagle khaki shorts seemed to be the outfit of the day. Clark, as he strolled out of his last class of the day, frowned momentarily at what seemed like his poor choice of outfit selection after seeing what everyone else was wearing. Physically, it didn't really matter what he wore in terms of temperature; he was comfortable in any temperature range the planet Earth would reach, from the icefields of the Arctic to the hottest rainforest. But the sunlight…the sunlight was a different matter altogether. For Clark, the touch of sunlight was like the breath of a lover on his skin, sending a feeling of utter euphoria throughout his body. Whenever he got the chance, he loved to immerse himself in it, whether on the beach, in the fields of home or thirty thousand feet above the face of the world. Clothing didn't cut off all the feeling, but it limited it – the more layers, the duller the effect. So, Clark tried to choose the outfit which would give him as much exposure as possible without arising suspicion. Today, it seems, he had been off.
In any case, he rolled up his sleeves and headed across Washington Square Park towards the cafeteria to get some lunch and meet up with a very special someone.
As he crossed the square, he heard a familiar pair of feet fall into step behind him and pick up pace, trying to sneak up on him from behind. He didn't turn to confront his pursuer; rather, he kept walking straight ahead, a smile creeping across his lips. He picked up his pace, gliding ahead faster and faster until he was striding along as quickly as he long legs would allow without breaking into a trot. The smile crept a little wider as he heard the pursuing footsteps, unable to match his gate, broke into a run and his pursuer ran around and cut him off at the pass.
"Very funny, Clark," Chloe Sullivan said, hands placed on her hips and giving him a scolding look. Clark couldn't help but break out into a grin at her playful indignance.
"We go through this three times a week, Clo. Don't you ever get sick of it?" he asked.
Chloe gave him her brightest fake smile, a gesture that would have left most authentic smiles packing their bags in defeat. "One of the most important traits of a good reporter is that they never give up."
"You're a regular pit bull, all right," Clark tacked on.
Chloe feigned sadness, and Clark rolled his eyes playfully. "I'm sorry, Chloe." He said dramatically.
Chloe instantly brightened, and together the two of them headed off in the direction of the cafeteria again. "Apology accepted. Now, I want to hear all about this whole 'saving the governor's daughter' thing, from start to finish. All the details."
Clark shook his head. "At least let me get some food first. I'm starving. Me no talkie well on empty tankie."
It was Chloe's turn to roll her eyes. "God damn it, Clark," she sighed. "Why don't you leave the witty dialogue to the professionals?"
"Then what am I supposed to quip when I'm saving the world, farmboy axioms?"
----------------------------------------------------------------Over pizza, French fries and assorted fruit, Clark proceeded to recount the previous evenings entire events to Chloe. He told her about how he heard over a police car's radio that the governor's daughter had been kidnapped before it had hit the news, and had tailed one of the detectives to the scene of the abduction from the rooftops. He'd watched through the windows as the cops had examined the crime scene, the governor's thirty-ninth floor apartment on 58th Street, and overheard them mention the name of a Russian mobster, Stefan Andreski, whose fingerprints they'd found at the scene, as well as the model of car – a maroon Lexus – he'd happened to be driving. Clark had overheard various hoods mention the mobster as a mid-level enforcer for one of the bigger Russian mob bosses in the Tri-State Area, and knew that he tended to work mostly on the far upper West side – north of about 110th street. So, seeing as how it was getting dark enough and the clouds consistent enough that he could go airborne without easily being identified, he took to the sky, flying eight thousand feet above the city and surveying every block west of 5th avenue between Columbia and the Bronx. It was on his eight pass that he found the car, pulling into the alleyway behind what looked like an old, somewhat worn-down tenement. He'd seen Stefan and his men pull the girl out of the back seat; a quick scan of the building with his x-ray vision had revealed that it was a pretty average whorehouse, without anyone else likely to cause him trouble. He had been just about to swoop in and save the day when he realized he probably needed at least some kind of disguise. This wasn't like breaking up a bad drug deal or stopping a mugging, he explained to Chloe; with something this big involving people this important, people would hear about it, and people would talk. Hence, the Indiana Jones costume. (Chloe accidentally snorted some of her water up her nose, she laughed so hard, when he revealed that part of the story.) It took him about a minute to zip back to his room and get the hat and jacket, but about three minutes to get back, because the hat (which he'd tucked under his jacket in order to keep the wind from tearing it apart) kept falling out, and he had to swoop back and get it again. Finally, he reached the whorehouse and smashed through the doors, disarming and knocking out the gangsters and saving the governor's daughter.
"Of course, that didn't stop one of the prostitutes from taking a potshot at me when I wasn't expecting it," Clark added as he ate the last bite of his pizza.
"So?" Chloe asked, not understanding why this would be a problem.
"So, I wasn't ready, and I didn't have a chance to catch the bullet. Stupid thing tore right through the sleeve of my jacket. I really like that jacket, and now it's got this ugly chunk taken out of the arm. Did I ever tell you the story about that jacket?"
Chloe shook her head, and Clark continued. "It was my father's. My biological father's, from when he came to Earth back in the '60s."
Chloe placed her food back down on her tray, intrigued. "How did you end up with it, then?"
"He gave it to my grandpa when he was on the run from the law – Jor-El, not my dad's dad. My grandpa had it in a trunk in the attic for forty years, until we ended up digging it out one day. Every time I wear it…it's the one piece of my father that I can understand. All the experience I've had with him – or whatever passes for him – he's been telling me what to do, forcing me around. But when he wore that quote…he was just a kid, like me. Just a kid sent to some other world for some sort of…spirit quest, or something, who happened to fall in love with the wrong girl and have his heart broken because of it." Clark's voice began to take on a downward cast as the memory of the first girl he'd ever loved trickled into his mind again. "That's somebody I can relate to."
"But that's all in the past," he said, his voice perking up again as he stood and picked up his tray, Chloe following suit. "Right now, it's a beautiful day in this beautiful city. I'm with a beautiful girl-" he put his arm around her – "on this most beautiful day of them all, Friday. And right now, I would like nothing better than to take a little stroll with her up towards Times Square. Maybe hit up some ice cream along the way. But mostly…just be glad to be alive."
Chloe wrapped her arm around him in return, reciprocating the gesture as the two of them stepped outside. "Sounds good."