Touched, Part Two (Strange and Beautiful sequel)
Title: Touched: A Sequel to ' Strange and Beautiful'
Author: D.M. Wyatt
Pairings/characters: Clark/Lex, Clark/Bruce - mentions of Oliver Queen, John Jones and others
Rating: R, mostly for adult themes
Warnings: Physical and Emotional hurt/comfort, non-graphic sex, non-graphic dub-con, future fic, post rift, songfic
Verses: Smallville/Batman Begins-The Dark Knight cross-over
Spoilers: None
Word Count: 13,487 (total)
Short summary: This takes place about a month after previous events, Lex discovers he hadn't really anticipated all of the consequences of the spell that had made Clark his. He also discovers that Bruce keeps his promises.
Part One Here.
~:::~
Lex hadn't been surprised when he'd discovered that Bruce had taken Clark back to his house in Gotham, but Superman hadn't reappeared right away. It had taken about three days after the Justice League's attack until he returned as the Superhero, but it was well before Clark had returned to work at the Daily Planet. Although, Superman hadn't done anything more than just be 'seen.'
Bruce Wayne had purchased The Daily Planet and Clark's building while the man of steel had lived with Lex in the penthouse. So his apartment was apparently unchanged from the last time Clark had seen it and his job waited for him, despite the fact that Clark had resigned with almost no explanation.
The paper's publicist, when asked, said that Clark Kent was on indefinite leave of absence. Lex had Bruce's dreary mansion and his sterile modern Gotham City penthouse watched and Clark was seen publically several times in Bruce's company.
Lex thought whatever Bruce had arranged to reverse the affects of the spells hadn't completely gotten Clark back to normal right away. While Clark was out and about and seen briefly in Smallville visiting his mother or with Bruce at the Wayne Manor monstrosity, Superman hadn't immediately done anything spectacular to save anyone.
It wasn't until, about two weeks after Clark had been pulled unconscious from Lex's bedroom floor, that Superman had saved a school bus full of children from crashing down a ravine. The day after that, he had pulled a foundering cruise ship from a storm tossed sea, saving thousands of lives.
So, Superman was back in full-form and Clark finally moved back into his apartment and had returned to work.
Perhaps inexplicably, Lex did nothing about getting Clark back in his life. He didn't act even after Mercy had asked him why he hadn't.
He didn't reply with anything other than his coldest stare. She didn't ask again, but Lex couldn't tell her why he couldn't. He didn't want to admit to her that he just couldn't again do anything like that to Clark.
He was relieved that things seemed to have gotten back to the status quo with no consequences suffered for him or, apparently, for Clark.
Months went by and aside from now openly dating Bruce, the two Superheroes were hardly out of each other's company, Clark had basically gone back to doing what he'd been doing before. He was writing biting investigative pieces for The Daily Planet and doing his good deeds as Superman.
One of the main differences between then and now was that Bruce had installed draconian security measures in Clark's apartment building and at the Daily Planet. It kept Lex from keeping a close eye on Clark, like he'd used to be able to do. Bruce's new seemingly impenetrable cyber defenses kept his technology consultants busy trying to bypass them both at work and at home, but none of that meant that Lex wasn't keeping an eye on Clark and, by extension, Bruce.
He still tried, even though things didn't always go well.
Lex hadn't managed to keep the miniscule spy cam in Clark's apartment heating vent (snaked from the heating duct in an unoccupied apartment the next floor up) for more than a day before Bruce's security team's constant security sweeps had found it. The hackers he'd been forced to hire (he'd only brought them in when it clear breaking through the Daily Planet's firewall to hack Clark's emails and files was beyond his skill level) hadn't even been able to get access to his work account, Bruce's team was that good. Although there was a brief taste of success: Lex's hackers were able to get into Clark's private email account and had found very brief and tersely worded emails from Bruce to Clark, only to find the path again blocked off within a half hour of finding the vulnerability they'd exploited.
So, nearly shut down from monitoring Clark electronically and via email, Lex had to figure out other ways to keep track of him. Unable to get a unit rented in Clark's building, he'd unsuccessfully tried planting several employees in the building, Lex had to settle for leasing an apartment in the building that faced Clark's across Clinton Street. Clark's apartment was on the third floor and his living room window faced the rooms his team had rented. They had state of the art surveillance equipment installed in the apartment, night vision and infrared and heat sensitive cameras and parabolic microphones and laser attenuated listening devices that could monitor sound made from behind even the expensive sound proof window panes Bruce had installed.
He was surprised that Clark never seemed to suspect. Lex had hidden the cameras and equipment behind expensive lead crystal panes that were mirrored and tinted in order to essentially make them impenetrable when viewed from the outside. Clark wouldn't be able to see in, no matter which type of vision he used. Lex wasn't sure how he could have hidden the sound of the cameras and lens motors, but apparently they weren't loud enough to catch Clark's attention so they didn't matter. Clark never approached the building except to walk past it on his way to work, and never looked toward the heavily tinted windows, not even once.
Despite the lengths he went to get video and audio feeds, most of the time monitoring Clark was boring. He spent very little time in his apartment, spending more and more free time up in Gotham at Bruce's estate, in the gothic horror that is Wayne Manor.
Boring or not, Lex would get copies of any audio tapes and video, no matter how brief the glimpses of Clark or how uninteresting the sounds he would make. They were still momentary images of the man he loved and those were sounds he made, no matter how unexciting.
He initially hadn't been sure whether Bruce knew about the surveillance teams across the street from Clark's living room. He was a smart man who was even more paranoid than Lex. Maybe that was why he always met Clark in a hotel downtown and never twice in the same hotel or room. Although Lex had tried to cover the most expensive hotels in the city, Bruce's interludes with Clark in Metropolis' luxury hotels always seemed to escape Lex's attempts at electronic surveillance. It was a bit strange to Lex that Bruce never visited Clark's place on his infrequent visits to Metropolis, so he was surprised when his team notified him that Bruce was visiting Clark in his apartment. He didn't want to wait for the tapes, Lex watched and listened to the feeds in real time from the office in his penthouse.
What happened was highly revelatory too.
Bruce opened a thickly paned soundproofed window; a window that faced the apartment his team was in, where the cameras were located. Even more surprising, he had even looked directly, and pointedly, at the cameras taping him. He didn't say a word, but from that it was clear that Bruce wanted to demonstrate that he knew he and Clark were being watched. On top of that, he left the window and the drapes open. That showed that not only he didn't care that Lex was watching, but actually wanted Lex to witness the two Superheroes have their date.
Clark made Bruce a rather elaborate dinner, which surprised Lex. He never thought Clark was much of a chef, but he made Bruce Chicken Marsala with Caesar salad, pesto pasta and homemade tira misu. After they ate, which Bruce had thanked Clark for with a kiss, they watched a movie, “When Harry Met Sally.” Lex couldn't see what was on the TV from the vantage point of the camera, but he could clearly hear the sounds from that movie.
Clark cuddled, at times even laying his head on Bruce's shoulder or holding his hand as they watched the film. The film was one of Clark's favorites, but not apparently one of Bruce's since he spent little time actually watching the film. Whenever Clark was too engaged in watching the movie to notice, Bruce would look directly at the camera with the coldest glare Lex had ever seen, a scorn-filled glower more worthy of The Batman than Bruce Wayne.
Lex couldn't tear himself away from his monitors, even when they'd made love. Even though Clark's bedroom was out of view of the cameras, it was on the other side of the apartment from the open window, Lex could still hear everything. Bruce had, probably on purpose (the man always did everything deliberately), left the door to Clark's bedroom open so the mikes had no trouble in picking up the distinctive sounds. It hurt to hear that on one level, Bruce now had what Lex had desperately wanted to keep, but he still couldn't stop listening, even after the noise from the bedroom quieted and Clark and Bruce had apparently fallen asleep. About two hours later, Lex was surprised when sounds of stirring came. Those sounds immediately preceded Bruce walking out into the living room completely naked and not at all self-conscious about it.
Not that Bruce had anything to be ashamed of; he was fit and about as well endowed as Clark despite being about two inches shorter and twenty pounds lighter. Bruce's earlier glower was back and he glared at the camera as he approached the window in the dim moonlight that shone on him from the window. The silvery-blue light made the bright white lines of scars more apparent than they might have been otherwise. The scars that crisscrossed his body actually did nothing to mar the beauty of his form.
When Bruce got to the open window, he reached up to grasp the window sash, but before he pulled the window down he stopped and glared at the camera. He didn't speak, no doubt out of concern of waking Clark (the man could hear a pin drop a thousand miles away after all), but simply flipped the camera the bird. He held the hand gesture for several seconds to be sure that Lex saw before he quietly shut the window and closed the drapes.
Lex laughed, amused by the pure territoriality of the whole sequence of events. He knew what Bruce was doing: it followed the same lines as buying Clark's building and his employer. He was laying claim to his prize, Clark. The entire evening had no doubt all been for Lex's benefit.
Bruce was showing Lex who had Clark now and wasn't above rubbing his nose in it.
To further prove the point, the next day the apartment building he'd put the cameras up in had been bought out unexpectedly. When he investigated the company, it looked to be a shell corporation that Lex suspected was part of Wayne Enterprises, but he couldn't find evidence of that in the incorporation papers. A smarter businessman than even Lex, Bruce wasn't stupid enough to leave a trail for him to follow. The only reason he was sure that Bruce had been behind the buyout was that his employee who had been the cover for the lease was the only tenant of the building evicted when the building went condo.
The excuse for that had been an outright lie. The man failing his credit check (not being considered credit worthy enough to be able to buy his apartment) was a lousy excuse because the guy would have been fired from Lexcorp long before he ever returned a sub-700 credit score. In looking at the man's credit data closely (Lex had pulled his own report) there were obvious plants in the man's data at the credit bureaus, but Lex didn't bother fighting the move. Before the man had been forced to move out, it was clear that they could no longer monitor Clark's apartment.
Bruce had somehow circumvented the technology that Lex had employed to keep an eye on Clark, the glass in the windows was changed out with panes using the same kind of tinting that Lex had used and the new window panes were impervious to his listening devices. His equipment was no longer effective. So, it was just as well that the man had been forced to move out.
Lex had to make himself content with watching Clark only from afar, always god-like and perfect. No insanity marring his actions, the purity of his mind and spirit now matched his physical perfection.
~:::~
A few days later, long after Lex had all but given up hope of ever being able to see Clark again, he'd even missed the last three press conferences Lex had given, he unexpectedly called. Lex had been shocked by his business-like and brusque manner. Clark said, even before Lex could ask how he was doing, that he wanted a meeting and wanted it to be somewhere public, but was evasive on why. He deflected any attempts of Lex's to make it more of a conversation and simply laid out his conditions: he wanted to meet Lex alone; he wanted no one else from his employ there. Not Hope nor Mercy and when Lex had asked, Clark said that Bruce would not be there either.
Curious what Clark wanted and his uncharacteristically business-like manner, Lex agreed to the meeting. Clark wanted to pick the place, so Lex insisted on picking the time. Although Clark hadn’t said why he wanted the meeting, Lex had never for a minute seriously thought that Clark was considering coming back, although there was a glimmer of hope that Lex might convince him.
The public location Clark chose was the Metropolis City Park, near the idyllic duck pond.
The time Lex chose was Saturday afternoon, only two days away.
It wasn’t coincidental that the time was normally when Clark and Bruce would be holed up in Wayne Manor doing whatever it is that two Superheroes do alone together on a lazy weekend afternoon. Lex smiled at the idea.
Being Bruce Wayne's cock blocker, if only for a few hours, was delicious.
~:::~
Lex quietly fed the ducks as he waited in the bright early afternoon sunshine, although there were clouds in the distance that promised a violent thunderstorm in the early evening. But for now, it was a beautiful spring day and the array of flowers that lined the footpath filled the air with a delightful scent.
Select members of his security team had kept the area clear by setting up bogus police barricades and running crime scene yellow tape everywhere. So there were no petulant kids and their equally whiny mothers, who were disappointed in not being able to feed the ducks like Lex was doing. They were kept hundreds of yards away by his security forces.
It wasn't good for his image, making kids miss out playing on the playground near the duck pond, but being the wealthiest man in town, he was also known to be eccentric. So it wasn't completely surprising Lex would want to clear the area so he could feed ducks alone. Even though he knew it would bring angry letters of protest to the city, he thought the bribes and the effort had been worth it.
His meeting with Clark would only be perfect as long as the noisy kids stayed away. He wanted no interruptions, or distractions, so any parents who weren't dissuaded by the crime scene tape or Lex's goons on his security team were paid off with wads of hundreds. The children's anguish at not being able to play at the playground or feed the stupid waterfowl were on Clark's head, not his, since it was his idea to meet somewhere public.
He waited patiently as dozens of ducks, deprived of their usual toddler benefactors, surrounded him as they looked for their expected handouts. Lex had to admit it was fascinating getting so close to wildlife, even spoiled rotten brats like these ducks. The mallards were beautiful, especially the more colorful and handsome males. He almost forgot himself and started to enjoy the experience when, as luck would have it, Clark showed up. Lex glanced at his watch. Clark was exactly on time.
He had to suppress the urge to jump to his feet like a nervous schoolgirl, but Clark glowering at him helped remind him that he was anyone but.
Lex tried to ignore the glare because he wanted to talk to Clark. If this was the only way he could now that he was gone, he would put up with the expense and the annoyances. Lex did miss Clark, despite how crazy things had gotten while he'd been under the wizard's spell.
As Clark approached, Lex kept on feeding the ducks, he waited to look up until Clark reached him. The flock of water fowl he'd been feeding were startled away by Clark's approach.
He tossed the rest of the bread crumbs in his hand to the ground and looked back up expectantly. Clark stopped about ten feet away and scowled in Lex’s direction, clearly checking him out with the x-ray range of his vision.
That annoyed Lex. “You think I've got something I'm going to surprise you with, Clark?”
The man’s eyes flashed angrily and he growled, really growled his response. “No, but it never hurts to be careful, especially with you.”
Lex arched an eyebrow at the Superhero. "Well, not that I'm unhappy to see you again, Clark, but why did you want to talk if you don't trust me?"
Clark looked like he was about pound Lex into the ground, his eyes even gleamed red, maybe he was thinking of burning Lex to a crisp.
Lex's eyes flicked to Clark's angry face and realized that Clark hadn't wanted to come. He had felt compelled, for whatever reason, to reach out to Lex. Talking to Lex was the last thing in the world he wanted to do.
It was like salt on his wounded pride and Lex could feel his face grow hard.
He spoke tersely, his voice low and bitter, "It's clear that talking to me is distasteful to you, Clark, so what's on your mind? Did your glowering lover make you come?" He looked around, as if trying to find Bruce. "I don't see him around, did you bring him with you?"
It was a bit unsettling to hear Superman's voice (a deep, resonant, clear and commanding tone), come from Clark. "I told you he wasn't going to come, I didn't invite him. Bruce isn't even in Metropolis. I wanted to talk to you about what you did, Lex. Alone. Yet you have Mercy and Hope and most of your security detail here."
"They aren't nearby. We are alone."
"I wanted to speak to you in a public place so there would be other people around, Lex, not so you could keep the kids and their moms away from the playground and the ducks."
Lex ignored that and merely arched an eyebrow. He tried to keep his tone as conversational as possible. "So, how have you been?"
Clark looked confused, "I'm fine..." He straightened his tie and pushed his glasses back up his nose.
"You look good." It was true. Clark looked better than Lex had thought he'd ever had, if that were possible. He realized that Clark's face was less pale than he'd been before. "Actually, you look better than good. You look well rested. Have the nightmares stopped?"
He too quickly replied, "I didn't come to chat about my health, Lex."
Despite his non-answer, Clark's manner made it seem like they had stopped. Lex smirked, "What was it that you wanted to talk about?"
Clark scowled, "I want to know why you did what you did."
"How much do you remember?"
"I remember it all."
He replied matter-of-factly, "Then there is no reason to question what it was I had hoped to accomplish. I had told you that first morning when you woke in my bed. We were destined to be perfect together."
Clark looked steadily back at Lex, his face showing a variety of emotions, finally ending on something like sadness. Lex gently returned Clark's look, sad that the love he'd previously seen on Clark's face would never again be shown to him.
Clark spoke softly, "It can't be just because you thought we could be perfect together."
Lex bridled at that, "Why couldn't it be? Isn't that something anyone in the world would want? Someone who's perfect?"
"Lex, it couldn't be that, because I'm not perfect."
He stood up and protested, "Yes, you are. You're perfect to me, you're perfect for me. You're like an artist sculpted you and the Almighty himself gave the sculpture life. You're so perfect, you're like a god."
"That's crazy, Lex, no one is that perfect."
Lex crossed to Clark and pulled his idiotically thick glass frames from his face, throwing them to the ground. He grabbed him by the lapels of his rumpled, off-the-rack suit and looked into the intense blue of Clark's remarkable eyes. The unearthly blue with just a hint of green was a color no human eyes would ever have had.
The moment stretched and Lex lived in the eternity that only happened when he was looking into Clark's eyes. The love he'd previously seen there had gone, but Clark was still the most handsome man he'd ever met. He knew that this moment would soon be gone and he tried to force his mind to remember Clark's face, the slight crinkles around his eyes and the deliciousness of his lips, so full and kissable.
Before he'd consciously thought of tasting Clark again, Lex kissed him with a ferocity that he'd never had shown him before. The taste of his mouth, the smell of his skin, was like an aphrodisiac to Lex. He was turned on and desperate to try and imprint the sensations in his mind. He never wanted to forget his slightly musky scent or forget how Clark tasted or how silky his hair felt or how smooth and unblemished his skin was.
Luckily, since he was too surprised to do anything at first, Clark actually let him the kiss go on for several moments. However, Lex wasn't surprised when Clark pulled out of the kiss and gently, and yet firmly, pushed him away.
His eyes were hard to read but his voice held bitterness and pain, "You don't get to do that with me anymore." Clark stepped back. "You can't just do that, Lex, just like you can't take someone away and change them."
"It was the only way that you would stay with me."
"It wasn't real, Lex. And you knew what that spell had done to me, was doing to me..."
"Yes, I did."
"So the ends justify the means? You can't play with people's lives like that, Lex. Not if you love someone."
Lex, as delicately as he could, turned and sat back down.
After he settled himself back down, Lex looked up at Clark as he towered over him. "I had to try."
"But you took me from my family, my work, my very life. You took everything and everyone away that had been important to me..." Clark's voice got rough with emotion, "I had no one except you. It was driving me crazy. How could you do something like that to someone you profess to love? Did you think that was going to make me love you?"
"You did love me and part of you still does. I know it because the wizard's spell wouldn't have worked otherwise."
"Maybe, but the possibilities for us ended a long time ago, Lex. You know that better than I do, you going to such extremes proves it."
"But the wizard's spell proved that it's not too late for us. You still love me and we could still be together. You just need to give us a chance."
"No, I won't. After what you did, I could never be happy with you."
"Are you happy now? Bruce is no better. He's manipulated you and has you wrapped up so tight, I'm surprised he even lets you out of his sight long enough to go to work."
"I won't discuss Bruce with you, Lex."
Lex shook his head, skeptical. "If he told you that he loves you, he's lying. He doesn't. He's only with you because he's won. You're only a goal he worked to achieve. Once he gets past the novelty of sleeping with Superman and gets bored with you, tired of his weekly Saturday afternoon fuck with the Last Son of Krypton, where will you be then? What will you do then when Bruce leaves you, Clark? Is that why you're here? You want to prove something to him to get him to stay?"
Clark growled his response, "This isn't about Bruce."
"Isn't it? Why are you here at all, Clark? Did 'Master Bruce' know you were coming down here to see me? Did you get his permission?"
"I'm not a child. I don't need anyone's permission to do anything. Bruce isn't controlling me, not like you did." Clark angrily walked over to his glasses from where Lex had tossed them.
"Didn't you think him buying out your apartment building, giving you free rent, and buying out The Daily Planet was a tad controlling?" Clark knelt to pick up the glasses. "Did you know he bought out the apartment across from yours? He did that so that no one he didn't trust would be able to peek into your living room windows..."
He was about to continue, but Clark went still, just like he'd done so many times before, and still kneeling turned to look at Lex. The look of pure fury was startling, his face and body were so still. Lex tried to think that Clark didn't need to breathe as much as a human, he probably breathed like a normal person only out of habit and to give his voice breath, but it was still unnerving to see his body be so still, not even his chest moving, his eyes held a hint of red where normally a golden blue-green would be.
Clark stood slowly, his eyes unblinking and his chest still unmoving, and took the several steps required to get him to tower over Lex. He stood there for several minutes, not breathing, not blinking, just glaring at Lex as the rising wind gently ruffled his hair.
When he finally spoke, finally taking a breath so he could speak, it was again Superman's voice that came out of his mouth, not Clark's. His tone was deep, commanding and angry.
"How did you know that Bruce bought that building out, Lex? How could you know? I hadn't believed Bruce when he'd told me that you'd been spying on me. You hadn't made a single move to recapture me, you hadn't even started your ethically dubious experiments to again goad me into confronting you. I had thought you'd moved past trying to control me and yet he was right: you've probably watched every move I've made since Bruce rescued me."
Lex made a gesture vaguely in the direction of Gotham. "That man didn't rescue you, he stole you. And he doesn't care for you. He's wrapped you up so tightly only because he wants to keep you for himself."
Clark slowly shook his head as he put the glasses back on and sighed, the most human reaction he had shown in the past few minutes. "I knew what Bruce had done, Lex. We don't have any secrets from each other and I was trying to help him through what I had thought was an irrational jealousy of you. I can see that I was mistaken and that I now owe him an apology."
Lex didn't know what to say. He could only look up in sadness at the angry man who faced him now. It made him very sad to think that the loving looks he used to get from Clark would never appear on his face for him ever again.
Clark turned slightly away, as if he was listening to something. At first, Lex thought it was some emergency that needed his attention. When he realized what had distracted Clark, he got very angry.
He touched his ear and spoke softly, almost like he was speaking to himself, "I'm okay...." Lex realized someone in the watch tower figured out why Clark wasn't in Gotham with his lover The Batman and asked Clark if he was okay. Maybe it was even Bruce on the other end of the small communicator.
"You can tell them to mind their own business."
Clark glared at Lex, "It's time I left."
"I'm not done talking with you yet."
"I'm done talking to you, Lex, except for one last thing. You need to tell me if you'll ever try to do anything like that to me again."
Lex uncharacteristically sighed. "No, you won't need to look over your shoulder for fear of me, Clark."
Clark scowled, "I'm not sure that's specific enough to satisfy me, Lex."
Angry, Lex spoke with a clear, crisp tone. "Are your lover and the Justice League listening in?"
Superman scowled at Lex from behind Clark's glasses, but didn't answer, so they probably were. Perhaps irrationally, Clark's friends and Bruce possibly listening in made Lex angry.
He spoke in a cold, resolved tone, and spoke more for anyone else's benefit who might be listening in than for Clark's, "Bruce and the rest of the Justice League might not believe this, and you might not either, but I like you better the way you are now: with a mind as perfect as your body. You're a royal pain in my ass, but I do love you, Clark. That will never change. I want you to come back, but I won't force you again."
"I'm never coming back, Lex. You should know that is impossible now."
Lex resisted another sigh, but only barely. He looked at Clark levelly and replied softly, "I know."
Clark straightened his tie and adjusted the frames on his nose as a sad look passed across his face. He tilted his head to one side, a sign (Lex knew) that he was listening to something only he could hear. "You need to tell your people to take down the barricades and crime scene tape. The kids are still upset."
"Anything you want, Clark."
Clark frowned at that, being the same phrase he used to say to Lex, and growled his reply, "Take care of it. You've kept them away long enough." Clark turned to walk away and paused. He turned back to Lex. "I wanted to meet here in front of a duck pond for a reason, to remind me of why I couldn't be with you, why it would never work. We would never feel that sense of wonder and awe in each other that the kids feel when they have wild animals eating out of their hands."
"Every minute I was with you, I was in awe of you, Clark. I still am and I would never deny you anything."
"Yet, you denied me my freedom, just like you deny the kids. You blocked the footpaths with barricades and strung crime scene tape through the trees and across the lawn to create a child free zone in a place that is normally full of children. You reminded me all on your own why a relationship with you wouldn't work when you kept them away. You can't manipulate people to make them fit into the world in the way that you want them to."
Lex didn't have anything to say to that.
Clark's eyes went out of focus and he tilted his head to listen again. He didn't say what he had heard, but he looked at Lex and said in a cold voice, "Goodbye, Lex." Then Clark, the love of Lex's life, turned and walked quickly away without even one last glance over his shoulder.
Lex used his phone only long enough to give the order to let the kids and their mothers through. Clark followed the narrow footpath which curved up to the crest of a small hill to his left. Lex knew that Clark was going in the general direction of his apartment on Clinton, which was only a ten minute walk from the bench he sat on.
Lex knew he should probably leave, probably stand up and walk in the other direction toward Mercy and the waiting car, but he seemed unable to. He just sat and watched Clark walk away.
The kids and their parents started to come over the top of the hill and even from a distance, Lex could tell that Clark smiled at them from the change in the curve of his cheek. Clark nodded to the mothers and nannies as they pushed strollers by him and knelt to talk to one particularly cute little girl. She'd been walking, or rather pulling, her mother toward the pond and the ducks. He seemed to have asked her a question and she said something that made Clark laugh in reply. Lex could hear his distinctive soft laughter rise up to the sky, the rising wind carried the sound further than it normally would have.
He stood and turned toward a quickly approaching man. Out of breath, his pale face flushed, the man looked like he'd just been running despite the fact that he wore an expensive suit. There was something familiar about him, even at this distance.
Bruce.
No doubt it was Bruce that Clark had heard approaching. His lover running to him is what made Clark leave so abruptly. Lex felt a tide of jealously rise up in him and he tried to ignore it, he wanted to turn away and not watch, but he felt compelled to keep looking. He couldn't take his eyes from Clark's form.
Instead of the expected anger or hurt on Bruce's face because Clark had met with Lex, something Bruce had certainly counseled against despite what Lex had taunted Clark with, there was relief and love. Lex's opponent proved that he'd won the war, even if Lex had once won a battle in it, by pulling Clark into a tight embrace. An embrace which Clark returned affectionately, warmly, and they kissed tenderly, but briefly. The version of Clark that Bruce had restored wouldn't give long passionate kisses in public like he'd done with Lex. It tempered the jealously somewhat and Lex felt a smug satisfaction rise up, although he didn't listen to the part of mind that reminded him of the reason for the difference. He felt sad that he would never again feel those lips on his own, feel the charge that Clark's open adoration gave him.
Maybe Lex had imagined it, he was too far away to tell for sure, but it looked like Bruce had given Lex a particularly hateful glare before he pulled out of the embrace. Hand-in-hand, exchanging smiles and affectionate looks, they both walked along the path and further away from Lex. He felt sad that he wouldn't ever again be able to hold Clark's hand lovingly like Bruce was doing.
Only once Clark and Bruce had crested the hill and were gone from sight had Lex finally stood. He turned to walk in the opposite direction, toward Mercy and his idling limo. As he got further and further away from Clark, Lex tried to convince himself that the tear that rolled down his cheek was because his eyes had watered from a sudden stinging gust of wind.
~:::~
Touched
By VAST
Touched, you say that I am too
So much of what you say is true
I'll never find someone quite like you again
I'll never find someone quite like you, like you
Lasers and the dying roses plead
I don't leave you alone
The demigods and hungry ghosts
So God, God knows I'm not at home
I'll never find someone quite like you again
I'll never find someone quite like you again
I, I looked into your eyes and saw
A world that does not exist
I looked into your eyes and saw
A world I wished I was in
I'll never find someone quite as touched as you
I'll never love someone quite the way that I loved you
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