Chapter 7

On Fire

Friday night - Lana's porch

After the emotionally draining revelations of the day, both Clark and Lana were mentally exhausted. They made plans to meet at the Talon for a late breakfast of bagels and coffee at 10 a.m. before they stood up and walked to the front door.

They turned to face each other just in front of the door, and Lana said, "Clark…you can't know what this day means to me. To know why things happened the way they did…" Wringing her hands, she continued, "All these years, I thought you didn't trust me with your secrets." Then, with malice in her voice, she said, "Lex preyed on my insecurities and drove a wedge between us…that jerk!"

"Let's not talk about him right now, Lana. There will be plenty of time for Lex-bashing tomorrow." Noticing for the first time the faint sheen of perspiration on her face, Clark said, "You might want to get inside and change before you melt away in those warm clothes."

Lana nodded her head in agreement that she should head inside, but stood unmoving on the porch. Curious, Clark asked, "Are you waiting for something, Lana?"

"You don't honestly think I'm going to bed without a goodnight kiss, do you?"

"Well, I…"

"After all, I've been waiting nineteen years for this." Lana curled one hand behind Clark's neck and pulled him within range of her lips.

kkkiiiissssssssss

Long and lingering, it was every bit as good as the kiss Clark had imagined at the barbecue. Same as then, Clark thought to himself, Oh, God, this is bliss!

Lana's thoughts were running in a similar vein. His lips are just as soft as I remember, she thought. I could never get tired of kissing him.

When their lips finally parted, their hearts were pounding, their palms were sweaty, and they clung to each other as though they were holding onto life itself. Clark gulped a breath of air and asked, "What is it that makes me want you so after this long apart?"

"I don't know, Clark," Lana said, "but I feel it just as much as you do."

"See you tomorrow?"

"10 a.m. at the Talon?"

"I'll be there," Clark said.

"I am looking forward to it already."

Lana opened her door, and calmly walked inside. As soon as the door was closed, she peeked out from behind a curtain to make sure Clark had made it to his car and then started dancing around her living room. Oh my God, she thought, What a day! Clark's an alien! And he still loves me…or at least, he loves the me he remembers. Same with me, I still love the Clark that pushed me away at age nineteen. With the feelings I had the instant I saw him in the flesh…I may be falling in love with him all over again.

Then Lana's inner voice woke up and said to her, What do you mean 'may?' That boy owns your heart…lock, stock, and barrel. You're just waiting for him to move back home and take possession!

Oh, all right, maybe I do love him. How weird is that? I haven't seen him in person since his mother's funeral and didn't get to say more than a dozen words to him then, and yet…whenever I thought of the man I'd like to be with, it's always been him. They say true love waits, but this is ridiculous!

As long as you're not lying to yourself about your feelings for that boy, I can go back to sleep. Which is where you ought to be…unless you want to show up at the Talon tomorrow morning with bags under your eyes.

Lana went upstairs to prepare for bed, but soon realized she was too keyed-up for sleep, no matter how tired she was. Needing someone to talk to, she grabbed her cell phone and scrolled down the list of numbers until she came to one her best friends and co-workers, Evangeline Skala. Evangeline was the vocal music teacher at Smallville High, and as fellow teachers of the arts, she and Lana had formed a near-instant bond when they started their teaching careers at Smallville High the same year.

Lana listened to the phone chirp as she waited impatiently for Evangeline to pick up. Finally, she heard the slightly scratchy alto tones of her friend's voice, saying, "Lana, is that you? Why are you calling so late? Is something wrong?"

"No," Lana said excitedly, "everything's right! For the first time in a long time, everything is just the way I want it to be." Or, at least, it's headed that way.

"Slow down, Lana. Let me get a cup of coffee to wake myself up," 'cause it looks like I'm going to need it, "then I'll call you back and we can talk about why you've been acting so squirrelly the last two days, 'cause I'll bet a nickel that has to do with why you're so hyper right now."

"Okay!"

Clark, meanwhile, was driving aimlessly around Smallville, just savoring the events of the evening and enjoying the feeling that this time, everything would work out fine. He eventually stopped at a convenience store to refill his gas tank. Walking inside to pay the bill, Clark noticed a display of some rather pathetic flowers on the counter next to the register.

The quality of the flowers was not what struck Clark, but rather, the thought that he had a lot of making up to do. Nineteen years of flowers bought 'just because,' nineteen years of saying 'I love you,' nineteen years of being there to support her…once again, his tendency toward seeing the glass as being half empty threatened to pull him under until he remembered what Lana had said earlier, 'Don't let the past eat you up, Clark. It can't be changed. Instead of dwelling on your mistakes, just make sure you learn from them and move on.'

I may not have to make up for nineteen years of not being here, but I'm going to start the next nineteen years off right. Still, I think I can do better than wilted roses from 7-11.

Saturday morning - Day of the Picnic

Clark had asked for an 8 a.m. wakeup call so he could be dressed, fed, and out the door by nine o'clock. Finally rolling out of bed by 8:15 a.m., he luxuriated in a long, hot shower. The steaming water and the pungent soap combined to fully awaken him after a short night's sleep.

Staying awake until three a.m. thinking about Lana wasn't helpful, but it sure was fun. It was nice to finally be able to think of her freely and not worry about what could have been, Clark thought as he rinsed the last of the suds from his skin. After toweling off with the always-too-small hotel towel, Clark dressed in a black t-shirt, green mid-thigh shorts, and a pair of white Reeboks. Clark quickly munched his way through half a dozen doughnuts at the hotel's continental breakfast in the lobby and finished the hasty meal with a tall glass of cold milk before hustling out the door.

Lana was just schlepping her way downstairs in a rumpled sleep shirt when Clark left his hotel. She immediately set her Krupp coffeemaker to make two cups of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee. Outrageously expensive, the special coffee was the one luxury Lana allowed herself. Just the smell of coffee brewing had a revivifying effect on her. Knowing she was going to meet Clark at the Talon at ten for bagels and more coffee, she decided to not eat any breakfast at home.

Lana dressed simply for the picnic, wearing a blue scooped-neck t-shirt, yellow shorts, and a pair of white Nikes. She grabbed a small clutch purse, threw her essentials inside and rushed out the door, determined to not be late.

By the time Lana left her house, Clark was leaving the florist with a box containing a dozen freshly-cut red roses. He wanted to make sure she didn't see the flowers ahead of time, so he waited around the corner from the Talon and used his x-ray vision to see through the intervening buildings. When Lana's maroon Ford pickup pulled into view, Clark waited for her to walk inside and then started up his Audi, pulled into a parking slot and walked inside, leaving the flowers on the passenger-side front seat.

Clark was quick enough to catch Lana at the bar, still waiting for her order. Enjoying the sight of Lana in her shorts and t-shirt, Clark thought, Dear God, it should be illegal to look that good at our age. Just as he stepped up next to her, the decaf vanilla latte and raisin bagel were just being handed to her.

"Hey, Stranger…long time, no see," Clark said.

"Hey there yourself," Lana replied. She turned her head and involuntarily eyed him from head to toe. And he wonders why I almost ran off the road yesterday.

Lana waited while Clark put in his order for a hazelnut coffee and a blueberry bagel before asking, "What happened to blue and red clothes, Clark? That used to be all you ever wore."

"I'll tell you in a minute," Clark replied. After receiving his order, Clark followed Lana to an unoccupied table. He set down his food and held her chair. Upon sitting down himself, Clark answered her question. "These days, I can't wear those colors. I don't want to do anything that would cause people to associate me with my alter ego. I mean, if I went to the picnic in a blue t-shirt and red shorts, I might as well get out the cape and boots and have an autograph signing session."

"That's cool," Lana said, "black's a good color on you. With your face being framed by black hair above and a black shirt below, it makes your eyes stand out even more than usual." Wiggling her eyebrows at him suggestively, Lana said, "It's really sexy."

"I look good in black. I'll have to remember that the next time I go out for clothes."

Lana took a sip of her latte and said, "I never did get to tell you yesterday, how you have changed physically over the years."

Clark finished the bite of bagel in his mouth before saying, "Am I to suppose that you want to rectify that oversight now?"

"Oh yes," Lana said as she waved for Clark to stand up. After he complied, Lana twirled her hand to signal that he was supposed to turn for her like she had for him.

Once again, Clark did as he was asked. When he got halfway around, Lana blurted out, "Nice ass!" Talk about Buns of Steel!

Clark's head jerked around and his body quickly followed. "What was that?" he asked, as he sat back down.

"Sorry," Lana said, apologetically, "that just kind of slipped out." Pretending to be giving this some deep thought, Lana finally said, "Clark, you don't look like you're in your late thirties like the rest of us. You look like you're still in your mid-twenties. Also, while you always had well-defined musculature back when we were dating, you've got a lot more muscle mass than you did then. You're a lot wider across the shoulders. Your arms, legs, and chest are thicker, and yet, you have a relatively narrow waistline and your muscles are still sharply defined. Any guy I know would kill for a v-taper like you've got.

"To sum it up, it looks like the guy I knew grew up and filled out, and then quit aging. You are an amazing piece of eye candy." Lana went bright red when she heard that last sentence come out of her mouth. She hadn't meant to voice that particular thought.

Clark was too busy choking on his bagel to notice Lana's beet red face. He'd been chewing when Lana informed him he was 'an amazing piece of eye candy.' Where the hell did that comment come from? Clark wondered. The Lana I remember would have died before saying that out loud.

It was just dawning on Clark that this wasn't the Lana he left behind all those years ago. This was a woman who had lived half her life since then, who had grown and matured. I don't really know her like I used to, he thought, but…I'm going to enjoy learning. Differences I accept, but inside, she's still Lana…still the woman I love.

When he coughed up the offending piece of bagel, Clark wrapped it in a paper napkin and then asked, with a large grin on his face, "I take it that my physique has earned your approval?"

"My approval, my drool, and a couple of other things you won't learn about until later."

Intrigued, Clark leaned in and asked, "How much later?"

"Well," Lana said, "that depends."

"On…?"

How long I can hold out, Lana thought, but what she said was, "On you."

Finishing off the last of his food and wiping his hands free of crumbs, Clark said, "We'd better get going or something bad will happen in the Talon a second time."

Lana let half of her bagel behind as they left the Talon. She was curious about Clark's last statement and asked, "What do you mean by that?"

"You know about my abilities because you know about…him. What you don't know, is that one of my abilities has an unusual trigger."

They were standing still on the wide concrete sidewalk in front of the Talon now and Lana asked, "What ability? What trigger?"

"The heat-vision. It's caused by strong surges of hormonal activity."

"Hormonal activity? Such as…?"

"When I get, umm…excited, my eyes get hot. The more excited I get, the hotter my eyes become, until they shoot out tightly-focused beams of heat."

When it occurred to Lana exactly which hormones Clark was referring to, she shot a look over her shoulder at the Talon and burst out laughing. "So the day Lex married Desiree Atkins…you were the reason the Talon caught fire?"

"Yup, that was the day I nearly burned down our classroom and then tried to torch the Talon."

"In that case, I'd better go home and pull on some baggy old sweatpants."

Suiting her actions to her words, Lana turned for her truck, but Clark wheeled her back around. Waving a finger in front of her face, Clark said, "Nope, nothing doing. I've got that little bother under control now."

Instead, Clark pointed her toward his Audi and they headed to the picnic together.