Interlude by Sori (33.1-minute Challenge)
Title: Interlude
Author: Sori
Pairing: Clark/Lex
Warnings: Spoilers for Reckoning
Notes: Many thanks to audrarose for the beta. *g*
Interlude
by Sori
The wet grass is soaking through his jeans, the dampness an uncomfortable heaviness on his skin. Clark thinks that maybe he deserves the small discomfort - it feels real and too much lately hasn't felt real at all.
Two months and Clark is still coming every other day. Doesn't talk (what do you say to the dead?), just sits, sometimes tracing the smooth outline of the words on the headstone, other times plucking half-heartedly at the blades of grass just now growing completely over the recently hoed dirt.
"I never took you for one to wallow in self-pity, Clark."
Clark turns to see Lex standing a few feet away, the wind swirling his black coat around his knees.
"It's not pity," Clark says but he's thinking of Lana sitting in this graveyard, five rows over, crying on two headstones a decade-and-a-half old. It's too easy to imagine himself sitting here, years from now, still trapped between wet grass and the rest of his life.
Clark shakes his head, studies the granite on the headstone - smooth on the surface, unflawed to the naked eye. When he looks close, Clark doesn't want to notice the tiny scratches and the cracked marbling in the veins.
Cheap stone, obviously; the good stuff was too expensive.
"It's just…." Clark's not entirely sure what he wants to say. I just want him back or I just want one more chance. But probably, I just wish it wasn't my fault.
Clark listens to Lex's easy foot-falls moving closer, stepping near, pushing into Clark's space like it was three years ago and the history between them was still simple. Lex doesn't stop until his shins push into Clark's back, kneecaps digging into Clark's shoulder blades hard enough that Clark grunts and tries to slap at Lex's shoes.
"It wasn't your fault, you know." Voice quiet, too quiet for Lex, and Clark doesn't have to look to see him - hands in his pockets, jacket pushed back slightly, the heavy weight of the fabric smoothing out the wrinkles.
"You don't have a clue, Lex." Clark shakes his head, frowning, staring at the numbers etched in stone. "You don't know. You don't…." know.
"I do know." Lex moves, pushing his knee hard into Clark's back. "I've always known, Clark. Much more than you've wanted me to."
Clark can't imagine how he'd forgotten that conversations with Lex usually ended up in all the wrong places. He's not entirely sure what Lex thinks he knows, but for once, just once, Clark's not going to try and hide from that knowledge because -
Lex knows.
And as scary as the possibilities, it's also freeing.
Lex folds his knees, lowering himself down next to Clark; pointy elbows and skinny legs and too much presence for any 24-year-old. All those parts disappear when Lex moves, smooth and easy and completely ignoring the laws of gravity and inertia. Motion taking over and just flowing until Lex is settled on the ground and their sides touch, shoulder to thigh and everywhere in-between. It's edgy and too much and something that's…not warmth. Lex is never warm, never has been, he's all cool angles and icy heat, but pressed up close, Clark can feel his skin tingle at the contact.
Strange and uncomfortable but addicting -- impossible to ignore, impossible to let go.
"Okay?" Lex asks, even though his voice holds only sure knowledge of the answer. Doubt's never been a word applied to a Luthor.
"Yeah," Clark says. "Yeah, I think it is." And it is - okay and all right and maybe not as bad as it really should be.
Mostly, Clark thinks, it's a start.
Author: Sori
Pairing: Clark/Lex
Warnings: Spoilers for Reckoning
Notes: Many thanks to audrarose for the beta. *g*
Interlude
by Sori
The wet grass is soaking through his jeans, the dampness an uncomfortable heaviness on his skin. Clark thinks that maybe he deserves the small discomfort - it feels real and too much lately hasn't felt real at all.
Two months and Clark is still coming every other day. Doesn't talk (what do you say to the dead?), just sits, sometimes tracing the smooth outline of the words on the headstone, other times plucking half-heartedly at the blades of grass just now growing completely over the recently hoed dirt.
"I never took you for one to wallow in self-pity, Clark."
Clark turns to see Lex standing a few feet away, the wind swirling his black coat around his knees.
"It's not pity," Clark says but he's thinking of Lana sitting in this graveyard, five rows over, crying on two headstones a decade-and-a-half old. It's too easy to imagine himself sitting here, years from now, still trapped between wet grass and the rest of his life.
Clark shakes his head, studies the granite on the headstone - smooth on the surface, unflawed to the naked eye. When he looks close, Clark doesn't want to notice the tiny scratches and the cracked marbling in the veins.
Cheap stone, obviously; the good stuff was too expensive.
"It's just…." Clark's not entirely sure what he wants to say. I just want him back or I just want one more chance. But probably, I just wish it wasn't my fault.
Clark listens to Lex's easy foot-falls moving closer, stepping near, pushing into Clark's space like it was three years ago and the history between them was still simple. Lex doesn't stop until his shins push into Clark's back, kneecaps digging into Clark's shoulder blades hard enough that Clark grunts and tries to slap at Lex's shoes.
"It wasn't your fault, you know." Voice quiet, too quiet for Lex, and Clark doesn't have to look to see him - hands in his pockets, jacket pushed back slightly, the heavy weight of the fabric smoothing out the wrinkles.
"You don't have a clue, Lex." Clark shakes his head, frowning, staring at the numbers etched in stone. "You don't know. You don't…." know.
"I do know." Lex moves, pushing his knee hard into Clark's back. "I've always known, Clark. Much more than you've wanted me to."
Clark can't imagine how he'd forgotten that conversations with Lex usually ended up in all the wrong places. He's not entirely sure what Lex thinks he knows, but for once, just once, Clark's not going to try and hide from that knowledge because -
Lex knows.
And as scary as the possibilities, it's also freeing.
Lex folds his knees, lowering himself down next to Clark; pointy elbows and skinny legs and too much presence for any 24-year-old. All those parts disappear when Lex moves, smooth and easy and completely ignoring the laws of gravity and inertia. Motion taking over and just flowing until Lex is settled on the ground and their sides touch, shoulder to thigh and everywhere in-between. It's edgy and too much and something that's…not warmth. Lex is never warm, never has been, he's all cool angles and icy heat, but pressed up close, Clark can feel his skin tingle at the contact.
Strange and uncomfortable but addicting -- impossible to ignore, impossible to let go.
"Okay?" Lex asks, even though his voice holds only sure knowledge of the answer. Doubt's never been a word applied to a Luthor.
"Yeah," Clark says. "Yeah, I think it is." And it is - okay and all right and maybe not as bad as it really should be.
Mostly, Clark thinks, it's a start.