An Exceptional Young Woman--Part 17/23
Title: An Exceptional Young Woman
Category: Smallville
Rating: Teen/PG13
Genre: Friendship/Romance
Pairing: Chloe/Oliver
Warnings: AU, barely detectable OOC
Summary: Chloe gets thrown out of Smallville High, landing her in boarding school, or more specifically, the sister school to Excelsior Academy. What will she think when she meets the young Oliver Queen?
banner by sarcastic_fina
--17--
Sunday brought a day that Chloe and most of her friends had been both dreading and somehow hoping for: the memorial service for Duncan Allenmeyer. It had been less than a week since Chloe's return, but Mr. Luthor had insisted on having it as soon as possible, and had paid for everything and organized everything himself.
...or, he'd paid for everything to be organized anyway. Chloe was doing a write up on the event for the paper, and she seriously regretted being assigned the piece. She knew it was a great piece, but it was very uncomfortable to write about a subject that so closely involved her friends...and Oliver. It was difficult to write from a totally unbiased perspective. Being who she was, she couldn't leave out any facts, but she also couldn't sweet-coat it. It would have been tempting to leave out the story of Duncan's actual death altogether, and just focus on the memorial, but she knew she couldn't. It went against her personal code of ethics.
She ended up confessing this to Oliver Friday night, on their way home from rehearsal. He had been surprisingly unperturbed by the matter.
"If it helps, I'm not going to get upset with you over anything you say," he'd told her bluntly, shoving his hands in his pockets. Chloe eyed his tense posture warily. "You don't have to tiptoe around anything just because you're worried about how I--or Geoff or Alden--will react. I'll keep them in check."
He looked her carefully in the eyes as he spoke, and Chloe believed him, but she couldn't help but notice how much his tone and posture resembled the way he had been that afternoon she'd gone to speak to him in his room. The self-abasement had returned slightly.
Finally she nodded. "I know. And I don't plan to skirt around anything, but I hope you realize that telling the truth still means it's not your fault."
Then he vocalized something he hadn't meant to. "And Lex? What about him?"
Chloe swallowed uncomfortably. "What about him?"
"How will this article of yours make him look?"
"I don't know. I don't think it was entirely his fault either. He...well, he screwed up. Especially as Duncan's friend, he screwed up. But nobody, not even him, intended for Duncan to get killed. It was a tragic accident, and that's the hard-hitting, journalistic truth," she told him firmly. And she believed that, too.
As Diana had said, in a way, they all had some of Duncan's blood on their hands, but that didn't make them murderers, not in her opinion. It had been an accident.
Either way, Oliver had been ever-so slightly closed off to her that evening, and Chloe had felt it. He wasn't angry, certainly not with her, but he was withdrawn. The dark look she kept catching in his eyes was permanently present for the rest of the evening.
He hadn't asked her to, but Chloe knew that he needed her to be there that Sunday morning, as did Claire and Diana. Geoff and Alden had not wanted to go. They didn't give their reasons, but Chloe recognized that they felt uncomfortable, as though they didn't belong. Therefore she was rightly surprised to see them, dressed in black coats and ties and standing slightly further down the hallway when Oliver came to get her that morning.
"I told them it was the right thing to do," Oliver explained simply. Chloe suspected there had been slightly more to it than that, but Geoff and Alden were both standing were their heads turned away somewhat shamefully, so she didn't press the matter, understanding that not wanting to go had less to do with not feeling guilt and more to do with feeling too much guilt. Instead, she slipped her hand into Oliver's and squeezed it comfortingly. "Thanks for..." Oliver failed to finish the sentence, shaking his head slightly and heaving a sigh.
"You're welcome," Chloe said gently. "Are Claire and Diana ready?"
"We were going to get them next."
They found Claire in Diana's room, both looking quietly subdued
Oliver found himself watching Chloe out of the corner of his eye the majority of the morning. Mostly he figured he was counting his blessings. It would be a lie to say Chloe was the first thing he thought of after Allenmeyer's death, but sitting alone in his room, the thought of her had dominated his mind. He'd expected her to hate him, to take some sort of satisfaction--however grim--in the knowledge that she'd been right about him from the first. He hadn't expected her to ever speak to him ever again. It would have been too much to ask.
So hearing her voice on the other side of his door had honestly been the last thing he'd anticipated. Even now he still kept expecting her to turn to him and look at him, appalled, saying, "You did this to him. You killed him." Perhaps he had underestimated her or perhaps he was just so drowned with self-disgust that he couldn't think anything rational. He only knew for certain that it was to good to be true that she would come to comfort him, to tell him that it wasn't his fault and that it would all be okay.
And then she'd kissed him.
Didn't see that one coming, he thought to himself, allowing a hint of a smile to tug at his lips as he glanced at her again. Chloe's eyes were fixed unwaveringly on the person speaking at the front of the Great Hall. He looked forward, realizing he hadn't been paying attention. The man speaking was the Excelsior's dean, someone who had probably never spoken more than two words together to Allenmeyer at best. Oliver tried not to concentrate too hard on what a complete sham this entire affair was. Paid for and insisted upon by Lionel Luthor, it was all a way to pretend they were good, caring people. Oliver doubted Lionel could even remember the name of his son's best friend before the day he died. Lionel was doing this all too look good. He scanned the room for Lex, and saw him sitting alone, a vacant, bland expression etched on his face. Even he knew it was all a farce. The longer he watched Lex the deeper he scowled. Sick, idiot kid. He knew he was one of the guilty party, and he knew one day he'd end up paying penance for what happened to Allenmeyer, but Lex...Lex made him want to vomit.
He diverted his attention away from Chloe, only briefly noting that Lionel Luthor was acutally here. Giving a speech.
Think about Chloe, he instructed himself, afraid that listening to the bile that was bound to spew forth from Luthor's mouth might send him into a fit of rage.
He watched Chloe steadily, noting the way her brow creased the longer Luthor spoke, her ever-tightening grip on her tape recorder causing her knuckles to go white. The hand he held in his own, however, stayed relaxed, limp. He purposefully tightened his own hold, squeezing each tip of her fingers individually. As he did so he saw her forehead smooth over again slightly, the hardened look in her eyes softening ever so slightly.
He wondered who Chloe Sullivan really was. Who was she that she was so driven and so determined to seek justice? She was unlike anyone he had ever met before. He only wished she trusted him the way he trusted her.
Asking a lot, there, aren't you? he mocked himself. Isn't it enough that she's even letting you touch her? She has to confide in you, too? He turned his eyes away momentarily, embarrassed by his own thoughts. He glanced back and thought of more arbitrary things. She looked amazing. She probably didn't even intend to. He could only tell she was wearing makeup by looking closely at her face. She wore a simple black shift, modest and appropriate and ridiculously attractive on her. A dark, forest green choker hung from her neck as well. Did she know green was his favorite color? He often wondered that, considering how much of it she wore. But then, he suspected that if she had known, she probably would have made a point to avoid wearing it. He smirked quietly.
As though Chloe had finally felt his gaze, she glanced at him, just barely turning her head to indicate she'd noticed where his attention was, an eyebrow raised to question it.
He shrugged lightly, and turned his head back, pretending to focus in now. He didn't. He couldn't focus. How could he with her standing there, letting him touch her ?
...not that she really lets me touch her. Not in the long run. He held back a tired sigh. Going slow enough for Chloe was driving him insane. She's worth it, he thought automatically. But it's going to be the death of me.
He flexed his hand, spreading her fingers out to match his, subconsciously memorizing exactly how much smaller her hand was than his. It was just about all he was allowed to touch her.
That and kissing, this time he actually did smirk, lacing his fingers back into hers. Kissing Chloe was an art, one he liked to think he was rapidly getting very good at. If she knew it was coming, she got nervous and anxious and it took a while to coax her into it--which she rarely gave him time to do. Instead, he liked to kiss her when she wasn't expecting it. She was hilarious when she'd been caught off guard and she almost always kissed him back...something that never ceased to amaze him.
Oliver tried to feel guilty when the service was over--for not paying attention, but he couldn't. He knew that the entire thing had been a worthless insult to Allenmeyer's memory. And yet, he was glad he'd at least gone because he didn't have many ways to pay his respects to the kid. The funeral had been private, closed off to anyone other than immediate family and the Luthors. Something else that rubbed Oliver the wrong way.
As they left the hall, he wrapped his arm around Chloe's waist, silently pleased when she didn't pull away. She looked subdued, however. He wished he could do for her what she'd done for him. He wished he could shut every ounce of darkness out of Chloe's world.
But then, looking at her, the pure sunshine that he brought into his life, he had difficulty imagining any darkness in her world at all. The idea didn't belong, and that made it difficult to comprehend.
Seized with the sudden desire to kiss her, he paused their movement, cupping the side of her face and turning it to him so their lips could meet.
"Whore," a biting voice tossed at them, causing Oliver to wrench his head up so quickly, Chloe nearly got thrown off balance. His eyes met Lex Luthor's.
In a movement Chloe missed, Oliver had Lex's back against the stone wall of the school, holding the younger boy up by the collar of his shirt.
"Apologize," he demanded.
Lex looked like he had some sort of death wish.
He probably does, Chloe realized, snapping into action automatically. She tugged at Oliver's arm. "Put him down, Ollie."
Oliver either didn't hear her or didn't care.
"Apologize," he repeated, raising Lex slightly higher.
"To that bitch? I don't think so."
Chloe tried to ignore what he was saying, but Lex didn't make it easy.
"But don't get me wrong," he sneered. "I think it's just great that the minute you kill someone, she suddenly decides she wants to screw you--ARGH!"
Oliver slammed him against the wall. A crowd was beginning to gather.
Chloe didn't know what to deal with first, but she decided stopping Oliver from murdering Lex was most imminent thing. "Ollie, please," she moved her hand gently up his arm. "Put him down. He's just hurting as much as you are."
She saw Oliver's jaw flex, and for a minute she wasn't sure whether he were going to listen, but then, slowly, he lowered Lex back to the ground and broke his grip. He pressed a threatening finger against Lex's chest. "Leave her out of it," he said in a low growl before turning his back and walking away.
Chloe took a pitying look at Lex, who was determinedly avoiding her eyes. She glanced up at Oliver whom the crowd was nervously parting for. With a deep sigh, she said to Lex, "You do realize that it wasn't either of your faults. Not really." With that she took off after Oliver, a pathway forming for her as well, the crowd already beginning to disperse.
"Oliver!" she called after him, and he paused, not turning, but allowing her to catch up.
Chapter One; Chapter Two; Chapter Three; Chapter Four; Chapter Five; Chapter Six; Chapter Seven; Chapter Eight; Chapter Nine; Chapter Ten; Chapter Eleven; Chapter Twelve ; Chapter Thirteen; Chapter Fourteen; Chapter Fifteen; Chapter Sixteen; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Eighteen; Chapter Nineteen; Chapter Twenty; Chapter Twenty-One; Chapter Twenty-Two; Chapter Twenty-Three; Epilogue
Category: Smallville
Rating: Teen/PG13
Genre: Friendship/Romance
Pairing: Chloe/Oliver
Warnings: AU, barely detectable OOC
Summary: Chloe gets thrown out of Smallville High, landing her in boarding school, or more specifically, the sister school to Excelsior Academy. What will she think when she meets the young Oliver Queen?
banner by sarcastic_fina
--17--
Sunday brought a day that Chloe and most of her friends had been both dreading and somehow hoping for: the memorial service for Duncan Allenmeyer. It had been less than a week since Chloe's return, but Mr. Luthor had insisted on having it as soon as possible, and had paid for everything and organized everything himself.
...or, he'd paid for everything to be organized anyway. Chloe was doing a write up on the event for the paper, and she seriously regretted being assigned the piece. She knew it was a great piece, but it was very uncomfortable to write about a subject that so closely involved her friends...and Oliver. It was difficult to write from a totally unbiased perspective. Being who she was, she couldn't leave out any facts, but she also couldn't sweet-coat it. It would have been tempting to leave out the story of Duncan's actual death altogether, and just focus on the memorial, but she knew she couldn't. It went against her personal code of ethics.
She ended up confessing this to Oliver Friday night, on their way home from rehearsal. He had been surprisingly unperturbed by the matter.
"If it helps, I'm not going to get upset with you over anything you say," he'd told her bluntly, shoving his hands in his pockets. Chloe eyed his tense posture warily. "You don't have to tiptoe around anything just because you're worried about how I--or Geoff or Alden--will react. I'll keep them in check."
He looked her carefully in the eyes as he spoke, and Chloe believed him, but she couldn't help but notice how much his tone and posture resembled the way he had been that afternoon she'd gone to speak to him in his room. The self-abasement had returned slightly.
Finally she nodded. "I know. And I don't plan to skirt around anything, but I hope you realize that telling the truth still means it's not your fault."
Then he vocalized something he hadn't meant to. "And Lex? What about him?"
Chloe swallowed uncomfortably. "What about him?"
"How will this article of yours make him look?"
"I don't know. I don't think it was entirely his fault either. He...well, he screwed up. Especially as Duncan's friend, he screwed up. But nobody, not even him, intended for Duncan to get killed. It was a tragic accident, and that's the hard-hitting, journalistic truth," she told him firmly. And she believed that, too.
As Diana had said, in a way, they all had some of Duncan's blood on their hands, but that didn't make them murderers, not in her opinion. It had been an accident.
Either way, Oliver had been ever-so slightly closed off to her that evening, and Chloe had felt it. He wasn't angry, certainly not with her, but he was withdrawn. The dark look she kept catching in his eyes was permanently present for the rest of the evening.
He hadn't asked her to, but Chloe knew that he needed her to be there that Sunday morning, as did Claire and Diana. Geoff and Alden had not wanted to go. They didn't give their reasons, but Chloe recognized that they felt uncomfortable, as though they didn't belong. Therefore she was rightly surprised to see them, dressed in black coats and ties and standing slightly further down the hallway when Oliver came to get her that morning.
"I told them it was the right thing to do," Oliver explained simply. Chloe suspected there had been slightly more to it than that, but Geoff and Alden were both standing were their heads turned away somewhat shamefully, so she didn't press the matter, understanding that not wanting to go had less to do with not feeling guilt and more to do with feeling too much guilt. Instead, she slipped her hand into Oliver's and squeezed it comfortingly. "Thanks for..." Oliver failed to finish the sentence, shaking his head slightly and heaving a sigh.
"You're welcome," Chloe said gently. "Are Claire and Diana ready?"
"We were going to get them next."
They found Claire in Diana's room, both looking quietly subdued
Oliver found himself watching Chloe out of the corner of his eye the majority of the morning. Mostly he figured he was counting his blessings. It would be a lie to say Chloe was the first thing he thought of after Allenmeyer's death, but sitting alone in his room, the thought of her had dominated his mind. He'd expected her to hate him, to take some sort of satisfaction--however grim--in the knowledge that she'd been right about him from the first. He hadn't expected her to ever speak to him ever again. It would have been too much to ask.
So hearing her voice on the other side of his door had honestly been the last thing he'd anticipated. Even now he still kept expecting her to turn to him and look at him, appalled, saying, "You did this to him. You killed him." Perhaps he had underestimated her or perhaps he was just so drowned with self-disgust that he couldn't think anything rational. He only knew for certain that it was to good to be true that she would come to comfort him, to tell him that it wasn't his fault and that it would all be okay.
And then she'd kissed him.
Didn't see that one coming, he thought to himself, allowing a hint of a smile to tug at his lips as he glanced at her again. Chloe's eyes were fixed unwaveringly on the person speaking at the front of the Great Hall. He looked forward, realizing he hadn't been paying attention. The man speaking was the Excelsior's dean, someone who had probably never spoken more than two words together to Allenmeyer at best. Oliver tried not to concentrate too hard on what a complete sham this entire affair was. Paid for and insisted upon by Lionel Luthor, it was all a way to pretend they were good, caring people. Oliver doubted Lionel could even remember the name of his son's best friend before the day he died. Lionel was doing this all too look good. He scanned the room for Lex, and saw him sitting alone, a vacant, bland expression etched on his face. Even he knew it was all a farce. The longer he watched Lex the deeper he scowled. Sick, idiot kid. He knew he was one of the guilty party, and he knew one day he'd end up paying penance for what happened to Allenmeyer, but Lex...Lex made him want to vomit.
He diverted his attention away from Chloe, only briefly noting that Lionel Luthor was acutally here. Giving a speech.
Think about Chloe, he instructed himself, afraid that listening to the bile that was bound to spew forth from Luthor's mouth might send him into a fit of rage.
He watched Chloe steadily, noting the way her brow creased the longer Luthor spoke, her ever-tightening grip on her tape recorder causing her knuckles to go white. The hand he held in his own, however, stayed relaxed, limp. He purposefully tightened his own hold, squeezing each tip of her fingers individually. As he did so he saw her forehead smooth over again slightly, the hardened look in her eyes softening ever so slightly.
He wondered who Chloe Sullivan really was. Who was she that she was so driven and so determined to seek justice? She was unlike anyone he had ever met before. He only wished she trusted him the way he trusted her.
Asking a lot, there, aren't you? he mocked himself. Isn't it enough that she's even letting you touch her? She has to confide in you, too? He turned his eyes away momentarily, embarrassed by his own thoughts. He glanced back and thought of more arbitrary things. She looked amazing. She probably didn't even intend to. He could only tell she was wearing makeup by looking closely at her face. She wore a simple black shift, modest and appropriate and ridiculously attractive on her. A dark, forest green choker hung from her neck as well. Did she know green was his favorite color? He often wondered that, considering how much of it she wore. But then, he suspected that if she had known, she probably would have made a point to avoid wearing it. He smirked quietly.
As though Chloe had finally felt his gaze, she glanced at him, just barely turning her head to indicate she'd noticed where his attention was, an eyebrow raised to question it.
He shrugged lightly, and turned his head back, pretending to focus in now. He didn't. He couldn't focus. How could he with her standing there, letting him touch her ?
...not that she really lets me touch her. Not in the long run. He held back a tired sigh. Going slow enough for Chloe was driving him insane. She's worth it, he thought automatically. But it's going to be the death of me.
He flexed his hand, spreading her fingers out to match his, subconsciously memorizing exactly how much smaller her hand was than his. It was just about all he was allowed to touch her.
That and kissing, this time he actually did smirk, lacing his fingers back into hers. Kissing Chloe was an art, one he liked to think he was rapidly getting very good at. If she knew it was coming, she got nervous and anxious and it took a while to coax her into it--which she rarely gave him time to do. Instead, he liked to kiss her when she wasn't expecting it. She was hilarious when she'd been caught off guard and she almost always kissed him back...something that never ceased to amaze him.
Oliver tried to feel guilty when the service was over--for not paying attention, but he couldn't. He knew that the entire thing had been a worthless insult to Allenmeyer's memory. And yet, he was glad he'd at least gone because he didn't have many ways to pay his respects to the kid. The funeral had been private, closed off to anyone other than immediate family and the Luthors. Something else that rubbed Oliver the wrong way.
As they left the hall, he wrapped his arm around Chloe's waist, silently pleased when she didn't pull away. She looked subdued, however. He wished he could do for her what she'd done for him. He wished he could shut every ounce of darkness out of Chloe's world.
But then, looking at her, the pure sunshine that he brought into his life, he had difficulty imagining any darkness in her world at all. The idea didn't belong, and that made it difficult to comprehend.
Seized with the sudden desire to kiss her, he paused their movement, cupping the side of her face and turning it to him so their lips could meet.
"Whore," a biting voice tossed at them, causing Oliver to wrench his head up so quickly, Chloe nearly got thrown off balance. His eyes met Lex Luthor's.
In a movement Chloe missed, Oliver had Lex's back against the stone wall of the school, holding the younger boy up by the collar of his shirt.
"Apologize," he demanded.
Lex looked like he had some sort of death wish.
He probably does, Chloe realized, snapping into action automatically. She tugged at Oliver's arm. "Put him down, Ollie."
Oliver either didn't hear her or didn't care.
"Apologize," he repeated, raising Lex slightly higher.
"To that bitch? I don't think so."
Chloe tried to ignore what he was saying, but Lex didn't make it easy.
"But don't get me wrong," he sneered. "I think it's just great that the minute you kill someone, she suddenly decides she wants to screw you--ARGH!"
Oliver slammed him against the wall. A crowd was beginning to gather.
Chloe didn't know what to deal with first, but she decided stopping Oliver from murdering Lex was most imminent thing. "Ollie, please," she moved her hand gently up his arm. "Put him down. He's just hurting as much as you are."
She saw Oliver's jaw flex, and for a minute she wasn't sure whether he were going to listen, but then, slowly, he lowered Lex back to the ground and broke his grip. He pressed a threatening finger against Lex's chest. "Leave her out of it," he said in a low growl before turning his back and walking away.
Chloe took a pitying look at Lex, who was determinedly avoiding her eyes. She glanced up at Oliver whom the crowd was nervously parting for. With a deep sigh, she said to Lex, "You do realize that it wasn't either of your faults. Not really." With that she took off after Oliver, a pathway forming for her as well, the crowd already beginning to disperse.
"Oliver!" she called after him, and he paused, not turning, but allowing her to catch up.
Chapter One; Chapter Two; Chapter Three; Chapter Four; Chapter Five; Chapter Six; Chapter Seven; Chapter Eight; Chapter Nine; Chapter Ten; Chapter Eleven; Chapter Twelve ; Chapter Thirteen; Chapter Fourteen; Chapter Fifteen; Chapter Sixteen; Chapter Seventeen; Chapter Eighteen; Chapter Nineteen; Chapter Twenty; Chapter Twenty-One; Chapter Twenty-Two; Chapter Twenty-Three; Epilogue