Smallville Clex Week Central

It hurts.

Clark's body folds like a broken puppet to the ground and it hurts. Shards of ice and snow press like little knives against his cheek and it hurts. The cold invades his lungs with each struggling breath and it hurts.

Lex has betrayed him in the exact way Clark always feared, Lex threw away seven years of memories for the belief that Clark is a threat to all humanity just because of Clark's heritage, and it hurts.

The fortress starts to crack and crumble around them, the sound like deafening thunder, and Clark can't save them this time. Lex made sure of that. He could run, though he probably wouldn't get very far, but Lex doesn't try. Doesn't even look at the exit tunnel.

Instead he kneels next to Clark, gathers him in his arms. Clark doesn't have the strength to protest, to push Lex away. He can only lie there, a useless burden, while Lex gazes down at him. A mirror flip of their first meeting.

Those heartbroken eyes will be the last thing Clark ever sees.

"I love you, Clark," Lex says and the confession makes Clark hitch a stinging breath. "But it has to end this way."

A gloved hand comes up to caress his cheek and Clark turns his face into it, a instinctive search for warmth. For comfort.

"I'm sorry," Lex murmurs and the worst part is — Clark believes him.

Even so, the kiss comes as a shock. Lex tightens his grip on Clark's face, leans down, and presses cold, shaking lips to Clark's mouth. He has no strength to move, to respond, as Lex gathers Clark tighter against him, hand cradling the back of his head, mouth a fierce pressure against his own.

He keeps his eyes open, catalogues the shadow of Lex's lashes against his face, the fine lines starting in his forehead, the smell of his cologine echoing faintly against the cold.

He looks at Lex until the world goes dark.

"I really don't recommend lying to me, Kal."

"It's Clark." 

"See, that sounded more like the guy I met earlier tonight."

Hard, green eyes hold his as Clark lifts the spoon from his coffee and sets it aside, the handle bent at an angle where Clark's thumb held it. He sees Lex looking and grabs the spoon, tucking it under his leg, just as their waitress comes over with their food. 

"Thank you," Lex smiles at her. "Can we get one more spoon?"

"Sure, you can, honey." She reaches into her apron and pulls out a pre-rolled set of silverware, placing it in front of Lex. "You boys enjoy."

Lex slides the silverware across the table to Clark. 

"I don't need a spoon for grilled cheese."

"No, but I'm sure you'll need it to stir in another sugar packet once you find out you can still taste the coffee."

Clark rolls his eyes, but Lex can make out a faint smile on his lips. He picks up one of the triangles on his plate and pulls it away from its other half, the yellow, plasticky cheese stretching until it breaks in the middle and plops back down to Clark's plate. He pats the hanging cheese back into the bread and pulls away a greasy finger. 

Sucks it. 

Lex shifts in his seat and picks up his fork, bringing the edge down harshly into his pie. "If it's not a multipersonality disorder, then what is it?"

He pops a bite of the pie in his mouth and relishes the tart sweetness of the cherries and the flakiness of the crust as Clark swallows his own bite. 

Maybe his tongue, with it. 

"It takes away my inhibitions," he says, finally. "The ring."

Lex looks at the ring on his thumb. "I don't feel any different."

"It only works for me."

"Are you a vampire?"

Clark makes a face and laughs. Then, when Lex continues to stare at him, deadpan: "Wait, are you serious?"

"Super strength, super speed, unexplained wealth, magic gemstones that change your personality. Only thing that doesn't quite make sense is the virgin thing, unless you were lying about that."

"I wasn't," comes his low voice, almost inaudible under the sound of Phil Collins coming through the speakers. 

"Did I make you—"

"No," Clark says, quickly, shutting that down before Lex can work himself into too much of a panic. "No. You didn't. I — the ring. It changes my personality, but it doesn't — I mean. It's still me."

I wanted it, goes unsaid. But Lex has a hard time buying that. He has a hard time believing that someone this shy, this timid, this demure would want to lose his virginity to a stranger he met at a nightclub. 

"If you're not a vampire, then what are you?"

Clark takes another bite of his grilled cheese after dipping the corner into a pile of ketchup Lex hadn't noticed him squirt onto the plate. 

"An alien," he says, after swallowing.

Lex laughs this time. "Right." Vampires, werewolves, and aliens, oh my. 

Clark isn't laughing. He's blushing.

He can't be—

"If you were an alien," Lex says carefully, "you wouldn't just go around telling people."

Clark shrugs. "You've already seen me naked."

This time, Lex blushes. 

Clark takes another bite of his grilled cheese. 

"But you look so—"

"Human," Clark asks, mouth full. "Yeah. I know."

"All of you."