summary: clark has always prided himself in being one of the good guys. and he is, for the most part- until you come along. suddenly, his hands are in places they shouldn't be while his mind plagues him with visions of you being oh-so-sweet beneath him.
clark kent x fem ! reader
themes: 18+ so mdni, yearning and a whole lot of it, jealousy, clark just can't help himself. kinda feral!perv!clark trying to be as respectful as possible but lowkey failing. filthy in the best way. enjoy! x
Always has been, and Ma would certainly like to think that he always will be. At school, he never got so much as a stern look and pointed gaze- after all, he was a sweet little kid that smiled a bit too much and tried to take up the least amount of room possible. His teachers loved him, the envy of all his peers.
During High School, Clark kept his head down. Did his work in a flurry of soft smiles and polite nods, offering help when needed, kindly rejecting any flirtatious advances under the bleachers that would result in him getting into trouble.
"You're somethin' else, Kent." Lana rolled her eyes at him once, flicking the spectacles on his face just a little of their axis.
College followed suit. While his friends joined fraternities and disrespected sorority sisters, Clark diverted all his attention to perfecting his degree. Sure, he had a couple pecks here and there, a few misunderstandings with a handful of very drunk and slightly deprived college girls- but hey, at least he didn't take it any further.
All in all, Clark Kent grew up with the belief that he wasn't like that. He was kind. Respectful. Ma would tell him so, and Pa would go to the ends of the earth to enforce it; listen 'ere, Clark, a lady should be left alone unless prompted otherwise. You hear?
He'd nod. Pa's shoulders would relax, and Ma would place a dear old hand on her heart at the relief of her son turning out just the way she'd hoped.
But then one day, during an intense intern briefing amidst the bustling bullpen of the Daily Planet, Clark Kent met you.
And he soon realised that he might not be such a 'good guy' after all.
Because it wasn't enough that your skirt was always far too short, or that the lip gloss you wore blinded him no matter the lightning in the room. It wasn’t even the way you laughed, bright and careless, like you had no idea what it did to the people around you- what it did to him and every fibre of his superhuman being.
Your perfume would linger in the newsroom ten minutes after you’d left, sweet enough that Clark could still catch it when he bent over his desk. Every time he did, his chest tightened with something ugly; vanilla sugar and lemon, wrapped in a pretty gold ribbon of guilt and shame.
He hated it, but he also couldn't get enough of it.
Your voice would carry on over everyone else’s, no matter how crowded the bullpen got. It was like his hearing had singled you out on purpose. Your heartbeat, your exhales, the slight pucker of your lips when an article brought on confusion.
Every other sound in Metropolis dulled itself accordingly, just so he could hear you ask Jimmy if he wanted coffee, or laugh at something Lois said, or mention your boyfriend in that absentminded little way that made Clark’s jaw lock so hard it ached.
Your dumb fucking boyfriend.
Clark never usually swore (it didn't come to him as naturally as the likes of golly and gosh). But fuck, Superman on Red Kryptonite himself wouldn't have the mirage of different profanities that Clark did for the man you called yours.
Funnily enough, he had never even met the guy.
Didn’t need to. He hated him anyway.
He hated the way your phone lit up and brightened your face when you glanced at it. Despised the little smile that curled at your mouth when you typed back. Loathed the thought that someone else got to touch what Clark could barely stand to look at for too long.
However hard Clark made you laugh, however red your face flared after every shh little compliment thrown your way- it was never enough.
Someone else got to walk you home, kiss that gloss right off your lips, hear you laugh when no one else was around. Someone else got to climb over you at night, cover your gorgeous frame with theirs, fuck you gently into the bed until the early hours of the morning.
The thought would come to Clark late at night, when the city was finally at rest and he had only his thoughts to keep him awake. He'd envision you writhing beneath him, soft voice dripping like honey in his ears, moaning his name like a prayer and begging, pleading, for his touch.
His release would come quick. But on the nights the guilt settled in too deep, it wouldn’t come at all- and he’d spend the next few hours lying awake in silence, trying to atone for every impure thought he’d ever had about you.
It made something mean curl low in his stomach, something he’d spent his whole life pretending wasn’t there.
Because Clark was supposed to be good. He was supposed to smile and hold doors open and politely excuse himself when you leaned over his desk to point something out, cleavage threatening to spill, exposed neck so inviting he felt like a rabid animal; your mere existence flooding his senses so completely that for one humiliating second, he forgot his own name.
Lately, being around you felt less like admiration, and a hell of a lot more like drowning.
You’d walk into a room and he’d know it before he looked up. His whole body knew. The tiny hitch in his breathing, the way his shoulders went rigid, the awful, immediate awareness of where you were- crossing your legs at your desk, tugging your coat off your shoulders, leaning your cheek into your palm while you read over some notes.
Clark noticed all of it. Against his will. Against every decent thing Ma and Pa had ever taught him.
Eventually, he did the only thing he could think to do.
He told Perry he needed a break from the city, his eyes never quite leaving the floor. "Ma and Pa..." he scratched the back of his neck nervously, the lie coming out in one smooth sweep, "They've been asking for me. Some fence panels fell, Pa's heart... just wanna be there in any way I can."
It wasn’t a lie, exactly. The Kent farm always had something that needed looking after, even if it wasn't an immediate fence post. There were always animals to feed, fields to tend. Plenty to keep a man occupied.
"Take the time off, Kent. You deserve it."
After that, the situation became a civil war in his mind; one that had him at a loss no matter the outcome.
He convinced himself day after day that the dirt under his nails, the sweat on his back and the ache in his muscles would drown out the ache you’d left somewhere far deeper. He busied his hands, giving them something to do other than grip the base of his cock at night, eyes squeezed shut, pretending it was your skin beneath his legs and your mouth wrapped around his tip.
He needed Kansas air in his lungs instead of your perfume in his office, your laugh in the elevator, your voice drifting over cubicle walls and undoing him with every syllable.
He thought distance would help. What with Ma’s cooking and Pa’s quiet talks on the porch, there was simply no way the trip home wouldn't knock some sense back into him; remind him who he was, who he was supposed to be.
Even in Smallville however, you followed him.
And by the time Clark came back to Metropolis, he was exhausted in a way no amount of sleep could fix.
Chair tucked in. Computer dark and oddly enough, collecting a light blanket of dust.
At first, Clark thought you were just running late. You were always stuck in traffic, and coffee lines always seemed to double in size whenever you walked into a café. He tried not to look at your desk every five minutes as he ran out of excuses to make on your behalf.
By noon, he was making mistakes. The backspace was hit more than a coherent sentence was formed; typos littered his edge of the column. Missed calls had Lois smacking him on the shoulder with a rolled-up newspaper. For someone so in tune with the written word, Clark even found himself reading the same paragraph three times over without taking in a single word.
Finally, he looked up from his monitor and asked Jimmy as casually as he could manage. Though the other man barely glanced up from his camera, Clark got the only answer he needed.
“Oh, she took some time off. Started a few days after you left, I think.”
He swallowed, nodding slowly, and that should’ve been the end of it.
“Guess her and her boyfriend broke up. Saw her crying in the break room last week. Lois said she’s staying with family for a bit.”
Clark didn’t hear the rest.
The words lodged themselves somewhere deep and awful, echoing through his skull all day. He hated how quickly his pulse kicked up.
You and your god-awful fucking boyfriend that made Clark swear (albeit in his own mind) had broken up.
A hot, selfish feeling unfurled in his chest before he could stop it.
You had been hurting. You had been crying. Yet the first thought that crossed his mind- before concern, before decency, before anything good that he was taught all his life- was that there was no boyfriend anymore. No one standing between you and him, the line between reality and fantasy dissolving into a thin blur in the week he spent throwing hay bales and flying circles around the equator.
That night, Clark lay in bed staring at the ceiling of his apartment, the city humming beyond his windows. For the first time in weeks, he found his restraint collapsing completely.
He let his mind wander, hands itching to free the stiffness in his boxers. He stroked long and deliberately, steady, the way he'd always imagined your first time with him would be.
He wasn't like that ex-boyfriend of yours. Wasn't selfish or needy or desperate. No, Clark would kiss the ground you walked on. He'd fuck you nice and slow, praise you like you were the God, make you come so hard the other guy would feel like fiction. He's not just Clark Kent after all- he's Superman, and even Superman has a few fun tricks up his supersuit sleeve.
You were a rocket. He'd overheard your conversations with Cat in the break room in the past, each one lewd and inappropriate but addictive all the same. Your ex could only last so long, only cared for a few unimpressive positions- but Clark, Clark could last forever and a day if you wanted. You burned hot and filthy and Clark knew he could match you without breaking a single sweat.
You'll come back to work soon- tired, maybe, eyes a little puffy from crying, soft from the heartache. You'll lean against his desk again, this time with no mention of another man. No absent little smiles at your phone. No reason for Clark to pretend he doesn't need you like oxygen.
He'll be there for you. Whether it's a shoulder to cry on, someone to vent to or an outlet in general, there's no other place he'd rather be.
And if, somewhere between the late nights at the office and grateful smiles meant only for him, you start needing him a little too much… you can't expect him to refrain from giving you what you want, surely?
Clark Kent is a good man. A nice man.
But if leaning into the bad is exactly what it takes to finally have you under him instead of just in his head...
Well, he can make peace with that, too.
