Crossroads - Chapter 9

by a campbell

Clark Kent/Lex Luthor, PG-13

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This is Clark Kent. Leave a message and I’ll call you back. *Beep*

Sure you will. Chloe bit her lip in frustration at hearing the same message for the fifteenth or fiftieth time, and tried to ignore the desolate emptiness inside. She gazed bleakly out over the Metropolis lights as she hung up the dorm-room phone.

Maybe he’s just too busy to call, she told herself. Or maybe his phone's malfunctioning and he can't pick up his messages. But she’d been telling herself that for a week now, believing it less every day.

It wasn’t like Clark not to answer his cell, definitely not in character for him not to return calls at all. The few times she’d seen him in the last month or so he’d been pale, tense, preoccupied, and despite some gentle prodding on her part, didn’t seem to want to say why. Chloe couldn’t help but worry that his father’s death and the breakup with Lana, not to mention all that solitude in the loft, had really gotten to him and that he was withdrawing from everyone. Even her.

She sighed. She’d tried Mrs. Kent’s line, too, but Martha was in Washington D.C. again and going the voicemail route as well.

Chloe’s goal was to be honest with herself at least ninety-eight percent of the time, and she knew she’d fall short if she didn’t admit three things. One: that she was delighted to know about Clark’s origin and powers, even if she wished she’d found out in a different way. Two: that she’d really enjoyed being Clark’s confidante since the previous fall, when he learned that she knew his secret. Being the one he turned to when he needed more than hacking and detective skills to help him out was great. Sweet, finally having him lean on her, level with her, trust her--the increased emotional closeness a related and welcome benefit.

And, three: desperately as she’d tried to deny it (part of the remaining two percent) since Clark and Lana had called it quits, a warm, golden glow had taken up residence in her chest and through her body and refused to be dislodged, no matter how half-heartedly she bade it begone. It just hunkered in, glowing brighter all the time. Consciously, she kept telling herself that a romantic relationship with Clark just wasn’t in the cards. They were friends, and good ones, and it was better left that way.

Seriously, it wasn’t that she had no compassion for Clark, whom she knew was devastated by the breakup. Still, all she had to do was think: “He’s free again. Unattached! Available!” and (pardon the cliché!) her heart sang.

She sighed again and stopped trying to deny the dismal sensation making itself felt in the very same heart when she realized that the phone had been silent for a good hour. Clark wasn’t going to return her call tonight. She’d try to hold off, just one or two evenings more, before giving in full force to worry that something serious had happened to him.

He’s just busy, she counseled herself yet again. He’ll call by tonight. But, if, by tomorrow morning, the phone still hadn’t rung, and her voicemail box still read "zero," what would she do?

She was just dozing off when the call finally came.

"Chloe?"

The voice she'd longed to hear. She jerked up in bed, awash with relief, pulling the covers around her to ward off the chill. "Clark. I was worried about you!"

“Sorry.” His voice, on the other end of the line, muffled and subdued. “I’ve been kind of busy.”

“Well, don’t do that to me again!” she huffed.

“I did get your messages. Thanks for being concerned about me.”

“No problem. I’m your friend, Clark. When I don’t hear from you for weeks, I worry.”

Silence on the other end. “You still there?” Chloe queried into the mouthpiece.

“Yeah,” was the hesitant response. “Chloe, I’m coming to Metropolis tomorrow. Can you meet me at The Byline for a cup of coffee? Nine o’ clock?”

“Sure.” She wasn’t scheduled to work tomorrow until noon. “I’ll be there.”

“Good,” Clark sounded relieved. “See you then.”

Chloe’s brows dipped into a frown as she hung up the phone.

**

“So, Clark,” Chloe faced him across their booth in a secluded corner of the coffee shop. “Why the long silence? I know you’ve had a lot on your plate now that…your dad’s gone.” She hesitated, not convinced that bringing up Jonathan was the best idea on this rainy spring morning, but Clark didn’t react. He stirred his coffee while adding a second packet of sugar, and fixed Chloe with a steady gaze.

"I have a couple of things to tell you, and even though you won’t be the first to find out, I guess I’ve been dragging my heels."

"What is it, Clark? You know you can tell me anything. After the past year--"

"This is different. And I know you’re adventurous and open-minded, but I can’t predict how you’ll feel about me after you hear it all.” Clark exhaled, slowly. "Lex and I are in a relationship."

Chloe swallowed her mouthful of coffee too fast and coughed, hard. “What?”

“Don’t make me say it again. I’m not ashamed of it, but this isn’t the most private place in the world.”

Chloe set down her spoon and fiddled with the muffin crumbs on her napkin, dropping her voice to a whisper. "Well! And here silly me thought all along it was Lana you--"

Clark looked uncomfortable, then away and around the diner. Tables and booths surrounding them were empty; only a regular or two leaned on the counter sipping coffee and chatting with the waitress on duty.

“I’ll always care about Lana. But it’s Lex that I love. Now, and forever.”

Chloe tried to ignore her plummeting heart and swallowed hard.

Clark licked his lips and looked back at her, dead on. “This is even weirder, trust me. Chloe, you know those alien powers of mine? And my status as a being from another planet?” Clark heaved a sigh and drummed his fingers on the booth tabletop. “Kryptonian males must be different from men on earth, because apparently I have other abilities, too. Like being able to get pregnant.”

Her jaw dropped, incredulous. She giggled. “What?” she hissed in a whisper.

“Stop it,” Clark’s cheeks flushed crimson as he glanced around again. Bus brakes screeched outside on the street. “It’s true. I x-rayed myself. It’s for real.”

Chloe’s gaze flickered down Clark’s chest, but his waist area was concealed by the tabletop. “What? Clark, you’re nuts! How could that happen?”

“Take a wild guess,” he said glumly, tearing another sugar packet open and, instead of adding it to his coffee, poured it out on the saucer.

Chloe, aware that her mouth was hanging open, snapped her lips shut and ran mentally through several years’ worth of memories. Clark and Lex, laughing over mugs of cappuccino and espresso in the Beanery and at the Talon. Lex glancing up at Clark with a slight, fond grin as Clark tried to figure out how to work the videocam for Chloe’s hard-won initial interview--right before she went careening through the mansion’s largest stained-glass window . Clark and Lex gazing into each other’s eyes as fireworks exploded behind them in the night sky.

"You and Lex," she said dully. "For how long?"”

“Since freshman year. High school,” Clark looked down at his cup and stirred the wasted sugar absently with his spoon, not meeting her eyes.

"That long?" she blurted in astonishment.

“And before you have to ask, he knows about me, now. My background, my powers. I told him a couple of weeks ago.”

Chloe pondered for a moment, mentally bidding farewell to her privileged status as sole keeper of Clark's secret. "I guess that’s no more than right, if you’re a couple. So, let me make sure I have this straight. All the while...when we went to the Spring Formal together, while you dated Lana, back in sophomore year and this past year--even when you married Alicia, it was you and Lex?”

"Yeah," Clark’s blush deepened. "The whole time, pretty much."

"All the while I chased you, and agonized over the fact that you wouldn’t give me more than a second glance?"

“Yeah,” he repeated. “I’m really sorry if it hurt you. I just--"

"Well, okay." Mistress of the Wall of Weird, she’d read, and heard, of things much more extreme, even if the involvement of her best friend did cast a different light on things. “Forgive me, Clark: I just had to get a lot of that out. Now that I have, let’s move on. You’re pregnant? What are you going to do about it?"

"I’m working on that part. Lex and I are both working on it."

"Ah, Lex. Right. What’s his reaction to all this? How does he feel about having a little Kryptonian rug-rat running around--"

“Stop it, Chloe. Just listen. I’ve moved into the mansion.”

“What?” Chloe’s mind raced. The mansion. With Lana there--

“Lex hired a couple of doctors who are crackerjack scientists, too. They’re sworn to secrecy. He’s paying them mega-bucks to take care of me, study me, and figure out how we can do this safely.”

Chloe shook her head slowly. “I don’t know, Clark. There could be a fine line between study and exploitation.”

Clark fumed. “Like I have a lot of choice.” A quick breath. “They use green K. With it, they can draw my blood, run tests, do other things. They give me special protein and vitamin shots. They’ve already done an ultrasound.”

“Do you have a copy of the pic?” she demanded, excited, and then could have kicked herself as she received a glare of annoyance in response. “Anyway...Clark, this sounds really scary. Are you sure it’s safe for you to be there? Are you sure--"

He cut her off. “I have to trust Lex, now, even if his need to know everything does scare me, sometimes.” A hard swallow. “I have to.”

“So which one of you is going to tell Lana?”

“Lana’s barely speaking to me,” Clark admitted. “It will probably have to be Lex. But we aren’t at that point, yet. She doesn’t even know I’m at the mansion yet.”

Chloe exhaled on a long breath and fiddled with her spoon. “Have a care, my friend. You’re swimming in dangerous waters.”

“I know." Clark drained the last of his coffee and slipped a dollar bill under his saucer. “But, again, it’s not like I have much choice. There are no solutions right now, Chloe. I just wanted you to know about this.

“And I appreciate that. But Clark, listen to me. Stay in touch. You know I’m pretty good at finding answers to questions and solutions to problems. If anything, anything scares you, call me. Right away. Promise.”

“I will.” He stood up, and now she could see that, before he quickly zipped his jacket, his waist did look--thicker somehow. Different. “Thanks for coming. Now, I have to get back. They want to run more tests on me by early afternoon.”

Chloe reached for her purse and raincoat but stayed seated. “Would it be out of line for me to say I’m happy for you? and for Lex?” she said, as brightly as she could.

He smiled down at her, finally. “Thanks.”

She sobered. “I’m here for you, Clark. Remember that.”

“I will." He looked toward the door. "You’re coming?”

“In a bit,” she replied. “Think I’ll get myself one more shot of caffeine.”

“Okay. Talk to you later.” She watched him stride past the counter and out of the diner, then disappear in the rain-soaked crowds outside.

Chloe didn’t beckon for a refill, but remained seated, fiddling absently with her empty cup as tears burned the backs of her eyelids.

Well, she had told him to move on. Guess he was following her advice.

Clark, she thought numbly, I just hope you’re not making a terrible mistake.

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