Chapter Text
He liked opening the loft completely, letting his legs dangle out the huge picture window. The breeze was cutting, a sharp slap for those who happened to be human. But to Clark it just felt like the gentle hand of fall brushing its fingers against his face.
He hadn’t anticipated seeing Lex that Sunday. Hadn’t called him. Hadn’t invited him over. But he watched the Porsche pull up the drive and felt something squirm between his ribcage. Excitement? Nervousness? Trepidation? He ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his tongue across his teeth and cleared his throat before resuming a relaxed position that said - oh, I had no idea you were coming!
“Clark,” Lex had moseyed up the barn steps and walked across the dusty hardwood floor in his thousand dollar shoes. He came to a stop at the ledge of the open window.
Clark looked up at him through sweeping lashes, the dying light of the day catching on his angular cheeks and plush lips. “Hey Lex,” he smiled, but it was missing some serious wattage.
Lex had something in his hand. A…carton of sorts? That held six beer-shaped like bottles in it.
Carefully, Lex moved to sit next to his younger friend in the open “window.”
“I’d say nice view, but it is Kansas,” Lex smiled at him easily but sensed unease from Kent. “Brought some apple ale,” he lifted a bottle from its housing, the amber glass clanking against it’s neighbor as it was pulled out. “You are strictly forbidden from telling anyone that I enjoy these.”
“Why’s that?” Clark looked at him quizzically.
“Because I’m a Luthor,” Lex laughed as he popped off the top and took a swig. “Luthor’s don’t go drinking apple ale or fruity martinis or anything ‘weenie’ adjacent,” he recited the words as if they’d been said to him - undoubtedly by Lionel. “No,” he let out an ‘ahhh’ after he took a sip, “we’re to stick with whiskey and bourbon. Or thousand dollar bottles of champagne. Vintage wine is alright but still earns me a sidelong glance from dear old Dad.”
Clark swallowed. The bottles looked good, their brown necks sweating despite the cooler weather. The sun was powerful as it began its descent over the miles of endless acreage.
“Have one,” Lex offered, seeing his friend eyeing them.
“I’m underage,” Clark said begrudgingly.
“Are you though?” Lex’s eyes narrowed.
Clark wondered if this was a ploy to get at his secrets but he didn’t have the fight in him to over analyze. Not right now. Not after all he’d been through over the weekend.
“I mean, what exactly is your birthday?”
“October 12?” he shrugged.
“Uh-huh,” Lex took another drink.
Clark watched the way his long pale neck stretched, the machinations of his adam’s apple becoming fascinating. God, the way his skin glowed with the orange sunset was mesmerizing.
Lex caught him looking and he darted his eyes away as quickly as possible.
"You don't look like any teenager I’ve ever met,” Lex admitted, hoping the statement would float by without scrutiny.
Clark knew that the apple ale wouldn’t affect him. No alcohol could affect him. It was a lesson he had already learned at last year’s spring formal. A disappointing revelation that had caught him off-guard even though it shouldn’t have. If he could take a barrage of bullets from a machine gun, what chance did alcohol have?
It felt like losing something…to realize that he could never get drunk. Never get tipsy.
Like he was going to be forced to barrel through life sober without his consent. Another door closed on normalcy.
“Saw your copy there of Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus,” Lex lightly chuckled. “Wanna tell me why the pages are dog-eared and the cover’s stained with coffee? Looks like you two have spent some serious time together,” there was a twinkle in Lex’s eye and Clark found himself embarrassed.
He shifted where he sat and cleared his throat. “Oh uhm, well…I had a disagreement with Lana. And I guess that put me in such a bad mood that I said some pretty stupid things to Chloe…”
“And now both of them are mad at you?”
“Yeah,” he sighed, dejected. He wasn’t sure what made him feel more alien - being an actual alien vs. humanity, or being a boy trying to figure out girls.
“Is it fixable?” Lex leaned back. His gray cashmere sweater looked so soft.
Clark knew that his parents were out at dinner but he was still on high alert. He almost felt like he was doing something wrong even though he wasn’t.
“Probably. Maybe. With time. And…”
“And the right words?”
“Yeah.”
The wind whistled across the landscape, breezing through the trees below. Lex watched as some orange leaves fell off a maple. The scene was almost too bucolic.
Clark shook his head and closed his eyes as he recounted both falling outs. “It’s exhausting. I’m always doing the wrong thing or saying the wrong thing.”
“Women are an enigma.”
“It’s a disaster. And when I try to make it better, I only make it worse.”
“Impossible to figure out but irresistible.”
“Sometimes I wish I could…could just…not even…”
“Not even what? Not even date women altogether?” Lex threw out, his heart was in his throat but he was feeling playful and let the words go anyway. He watched them float away, up up and away like a kite and wondered if he would have to reel it all back in before the puritan farmboy put two and two together and freaked.
“Yeah,” he muttered, dejected.
“Men aren’t always easier,” Lex added, pushing the envelope. Rather than reel the kite in, he was giving it string. Surely he’d be strangled by it soon enough. Maybe the drinks were getting to him. They weren’t his first of the day.
He could feel the weight of Clark’s stare on the side of his face the same way your body heats when half of it is directly in the sun.
“Y-you’ve…dated men?” Clark sounded unsure, wondering if he’d missed something.
“Yeah,” Lex just took another drink and kept his eyes straight forward.
“Oh.”
Silence.
The sound of wind pushing the barn doors where they were held open by a metal hook. The creak of old wood. The whoosh of wind.
“Is that too much information?”
“What? No,” Clark said too quickly.
Why was his neck so hot but his hands felt so cold? He swallowed but he’d run out of spit at some point.
“Do you disapprove?” Lex asked into the opening of the bottle, his voice dipping as it disappeared inside.
“No, of course not. I’m not…I’m not judgemental like that,” Clark was suddenly very aware of his body. How he sat. How much he was moving. Was he breathing enough? Dammit, now he was thinking about blinks. Was he blinking too much or not enough?
“You’re an outlier then,” Lex added. “I don’t know if you noticed, but Kansas as a whole tends to frown upon homosexual relationships,” he just kept drinking. The bottle a lifeline in his hand. Five more of them at his side in case he talked himself into oblivion and needed a mental reprieve.
“So you’ve had…relationships…with men?” Clark hated how doe-y he sounded. Naive. Small. Unsure. Like a kid who’d never been ice skating before and their legs were going in two different directions like toothpicks.
Lex looked over at him, amusement lighting his features.
“Oh, well I meant, I just didn't know if…if it was just something you tried out or…” he tripped over himself with a sort of snowballing effect that was magnificent in its blundery splendor.
“I went to an all boys boarding school,” Lex cocked a grin. His voice was lower than usual and it felt like it was turning Clark’s insides to soup. A hot, churning soup. “Then I went to study abroad in Europe. College. Back to Metropolis. Plenty of time for different things,” he shrugged, taking his eyes off Kent before the young man imploded. “Some of which were relationships.”
“Oh,” the singular word fell heavily between them.
Clark felt himself getting both aroused and jealous. Both surprised him in equal measure.
He had no right to be jealous. Lex was older than him. He couldn’t have ‘gotten there first,’ it wasn’t possible. Time hadn’t allowed it. But then…where the hell had that thought come from? Since when had he wished he’d ‘gotten there first’ with Lex?
His heartbeat began to steadily increase in his groin and he prayed that Lex would not notice.
“I should probably leave you to your reading,” Lex said as swiftly and quickly as the breeze. “The sun’s basically set. Your parents should be coming back soon.”
Shit. They would be.
How did Lex know that though?
“Are you going to go back to reading?” curiosity lingered in Lex’s words. His face was almost more beautiful in the near dark than it was during the sunset. Or was it just a different kind of beauty? Clark couldn’t tell.
His body was relaxed. His arms propping him up. His face turned towards him. His voice was so rich - like a chocolate souffle. It went down easy.
“No…I’m…I’m done trying to figure out the opposite sex,” he chuckled nervously. His cheeks were pink. “For tonight at least.” He thought about backing up and standing, his hand outstretched to pull Lex up. But then…he couldn’t. Not with an erection. Dang it. He really wished he could, that way he could touch Lex’s hand.
That was a normal thing to want, right?
Lex looked like marble. Cold and sculpted. But Clark knew that his hand would be warm.
Luthor was the one who scooted back and stood and Clark scrambled to his feet after him.
“Are you going to do anything fun for halloween?” Clark asked, wiping imaginary dust from the front of his jeans.
Lex shrugged. “Probably,” he tossed back the rest of his drink, finishing it. He put the empty bottle back in the little six pack to take with him. “What’s Clark Kent doing for Halloween?”
“Oh, uh…I don’t know yet.”
“Hmm,” Lex eyed him. “Have a costume?”
Clark’s hands were knotted in front of him. “No, I don’t. Mom used to make my costumes when I was little. Now that I’m grown up…well…it’s kind of a waste of money.”
“Hmm,” Lex made the noise again. Clark’s intestines turned molten. Luthor’s head was tilted, his sharp eyes boring into Kent like languid lasers. “You could always just be a farmer,” Lex smiled. “Go shirtless. Get a pair of suspenders…you’ll have the ladies falling all over you,” he clapped him on the upper arm and turned to leave.”
Clark laughed a weak laugh. “Haha, yeah…the ladies.”
Lex’s footsteps were so loud in the expansive space as he walked towards the steps. He had the carton in his left hand and touched the wood railing with his right before descending. The look he gave Clark was something indescribable.
“Goodnight Clark,” he gave a customary smile.
“Goodnight Lex.”