Chapter three

"Lex. What are you doing here? What do you want?"

Clark didn't even flinch as Lex let out a laugh, "What not happy to see me? Perhaps you'd be more interested in my company if I'd brought my wife with me. Lana's presence always seemed to captivate your attention."

Lex's voice was laced with bravado but Clark knew on some level it hurt Lex to think of Clark and Lana's past, the jealousy he held onto was an insecurity that he could never surpass.

Clark exhaled deeply; tired of the argument he'd had with former best friend a million times before.

"I haven't talked to Lana since the day she married you Lex."

Clark finally turned to face Lex and the two shared a significant look of meaning that Kara could not identify.

Honestly I thought that we could make it all the way,

But stone by stone the castle crumbled to the ground.

They stood in the small room, facing opposite direction. Clark surveyed the landscape of the church through the small glasses window, it was raining, and the storm clouds were threatening to erupt in loud bouts of thunder.

"Tell me Clark, please just tell me your secret and I'll leave Lex, I'll walk away with you right now. But you have to trust me." Lana begged tears staining her painted cheeks.

Hearing the voice he thought he loved all these years demand so much of him, so damn much, caused him to do something he never thought he'd have the courage to.

He remained facing the storm, letting the sound of thunder roll over him steeling away the strength he needed to do what had to be done.

"I can't. After everything that's been said and done, I don't love you anymore Lana not like i thought i did."

Lana gasped and took a step back, "You don't mean that."

He turned to face her, and she became aware just how much Clark had changed this past year.

He was taller, more confident in his words, even more mysterious than she remembered and it angered her.

Her eyes narrowed, looking at him through small slits she huffed.

"Fine, you've made your decision. And I've made mine. I'm going to marry Lex, and there's nothing you can do to stop me."

Clark shook his head lightly at her attitude and turned back to face the window.

"Don't marry Lex to spite me Lana, marry him because you love him."

He herd puff out another breath of annoyance, "You could at least act mature Clark. I would never marry someone just to spite you." But her words quavered and they both knew she would do exactly that.

Clark smiled sadly at her, wondering why it took him so long to see that Lana could never be what he epitomized her to. All these years he'd held her on a pedestal and it wasn't her fault she couldn't measure up. He wanted to be normal and she was normal.

Lana was a cheerleader, smart, innocent, naïve, pretty and the girl next door she really was the most normal girl you could ever met and only recently had he realized that around her, that being with her, made him feel like even more of a freak, an alien.

Everything that he once valued about her suddenly became everything that convinced him that he had made a mistake in confusing his first high school crush with the love of his life. Because if he was honest with himself, really honest, he could admit that Lana wasn't the girl he thought she was and that maybe all this time he hadn't been in love with her. He'd been in love with the idea of her.

"I am being mature Lana." He replied with no hint of malice or sarcasm, "You know Lois says that when one door closes another one opens." Clark stared at the rain as it dyed down apparently lost in his own thoughts,

"I hope your happy Lana, you deserve to be happy. We both do."

He put a comforting hand on her shoulder as he walked out the door, shutting it firmly behind him.

"Right, yes. When you came to her dressing room door and begged for her to leave me moments before our wedding? How chivalrous of you."

Clark's features hardened upon finding out that Lana had lied about their encounter and Lex mistook this as a sign of guilt.

"Oh, you didn't think she'd tell me?"

Clark shrugged nonchantly repeating Lex's words to him, "Think what you want Lex, but i didn't take Lana from you, you lost her all on your own."

Lex raised his eyebrows in indignation, "Lost her? Did you forget whose last name she took, whose mansion she's living in ", Lex's voice became dangerous, "whose baby she carrying."

But to Lex's dismay Clark did not appear concerned or jealous by this admission.

"I told Lana the day of your wedding that i wanted her to be happy and it sounds like she is, so what are you doing here?"

Lex's grip on the barn railing tightened, he was hear to gloat the fact that he'd knocked up Lana Lang, to see the look on Clark's face when he heard the glorious news why the fuck else would he be there.

But apparently Clark had grown a spine in the time they hadn't spoken and it irked Lex to think that he could no longer bait him with taunts of Lana.

"Congratulations on impregnating your mundanely boring wife." Kara genuinely beamed at Lex disrupting the tension in the loft, "I hope the fetus does not inherit your predisposition to be bald and obnoxious." She added in faux-concern.

Clark tried unsuccessfully to bottle in his laughter but it spilled out earning a giggle from Kara.

Lex stormed from the loft and down the stairs to his awaiting limousine sending a murderous look over his shoulder; if Lana Lang was no longer Clark Kent's weakness then he would discover what was.