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Part 4 of Somewhere I Have Never Travelled
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2004-07-03
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Take You There

Summary:

"Why did you have to win? Why didn't I stand up and start yelling about your crimes at that last rally?"

Notes:

I really wish I could excuse this, but really, I'm just indulging myself right now. It's fun. I like this universe. Set directly after Gladly Beyond.

Work Text:

Clark thinks he's been standing here too long, just looking. Boxes of personal effects packed and being taken away, dust covers placed on the furniture in half the rooms. There's the vaguest sense of generalized mourning, because dammit, this is home, *has* been home, and now�

"Still sulking?" A hand presses briefly against the small of his back. Clark doesn't need to look to know Lex is smiling. "You'll like it, I promise."

"I won't like it." Clark doesn't like change. Change, often times, *sucks*. Routine is nice. Stability is nice. Not-moving? Also nice. "Why did you have to win? Why didn't I stand up and start yelling about your crimes at that last rally?"

Lex snickers softly. "Murder of babies in a hospital, Clark. I warned you." Warm lips press against the back of his neck, and Clark sighs when Lex's hand slides around his waist, resting against his stomach. "You like our house in DC."

Clark reaches up enough to lace his fingers through Lex's. "We weren't there much. It was like vacation." Sort of. Metropolis is where his job is, his home is, his *life* is. And for that matter, where Clark knows he can get the perfect bagel every morning.

"Come on. Stop depressing yourself." Lex pulls lightly, just enough for Clark to turn around, and he notices the servants look relieved. "And scaring the staff, for that matter. Standing there looking pissed and intimidating doesn't really encourage speed, and we have to leave tomorrow morning."

"Right." He's being coaxed and resents it. He's moving. From home. Not forever, but Clark's studied the polls, read the data, and God knows, he's up and personal with Lex's spin doctors. Lex will do two terms, and that, well, will be eight years. Even with occasional trips back, it's still-- "You know Lois is coming up for the inauguration, right?"

Lex makes a sound a lot like a growl, and that helps. Lex has been *way* too cheerful about this move. Damn him to hell.

Sitting down on the sofa, Clark watches Lex go on a search for water before coming back. He looks up with raised eyebrows as his feet are kicked together, then Lex straddles his lap, water bottle in hand.

"It's the public thing, isn't it?"

"Senators have their own houses, their own staffs, and this amazing thing called relative privacy. Now--" Clark frowns, watching Lex twist off the cap to the water. "If you say again 'I told you so', I swear I'll drop you on the floor."

Lex grins, bracing a hand on the back of the couch. "People like you, Clark. You're very popular. Get used to it."

"I didn't like it when I was flying around in tights, either."

Lex seems to mull this. "You were hot in the tights." The blue eyes sharpen briefly and Clark sighs, leaning his head back on the cushions. "Here's a cheering thought for you. Every night when you go to bed from the day after tomorrow on, you'll be aware the same man who can order a nuclear strike anywhere he pleases can and will be begging you if you want him to." Clark's cock jumps, much to Clark's annoyance. Dammit. *Dammit*. "Power's a turn-on. You know that."

"So's taking it," Clark says, staring at the ceiling. "I keep telling myself, I'm not being kept. This is a relationship--"

"Marriage." Yeah, that had been one of those times Clark had decided not to ask exactly what it took to get that bill passed. It's balance. "You had a job�."

"Yeah." Clark tilts his head enough to squint at Lex. "I had a job. I quit it, because someone in the room said, I need to move to DC and I want you with me. Lured me, really. Said, you can write freelance. And look! I'll change the laws while I'm at it."

Lex gives him a considering look. "I don't remember the conversation going like that." Lex leans forward, licking gently at Clark's neck. "Your income bracket jumped when you started charging by the article. I know. I do your taxes."

Clark frowns. "Stop trying to make this sound reasonable."

"Stop acting like this move is the end of the world. Yes, you will have to upgrade your wardrobe with a distinct lack of denim and flannel. No, we won't be in Metropolis. Yes, I'm so very sorry that we won't have the pleasure of Lois' company *every* fucking Sunday dinner for a while." A brush of sharp teeth and Clark arches. Lex has a dozen weapons to use, but sex's probably his best. At least on Clark. "I'm sure she'll be happy to be imported regularly to DC to see what kind of havoc she can wreck."

Clark sighs. "The jokes are appalling." First Gentleman. Dearest God.

Lex lifts up, smiling sunnily, like a kid who just heard the best joke ever. "They really are."

Clark frowns again, resting his hands on Lex's thighs. "You're so lucky I love you. I wouldn't put up with this otherwise."

Lex kisses him lightly, blue eyes sparkling with all the light in the world. Warm lips settle on his ear. "First night there? Fuck me in the oval office. Bent over the desk. Looking right out the windows"

Clark shudders and this is--oh damn. Damn. "I'm--trying to be in a bad mood."

"I'm trying to get laid. My goal's more worthy than yours." Clark lets himself be urged to stretch out on the couch, eyes falling closed at the teeth in his throat. "Have I told you how hot you are when you're sulking?"

Reaching up, Clark closes both hands on the arms of the sofa, arching his hips, smiling when Lex groans against his ear.

"There are people here."

Lex is unbuttoning his shirt, following with his tongue. "They'll go away."

Clark catches too-interested hands, trying desperately to think of something distracting that doesn't involve imminent nudity. "Moving tomorrow?" Clark already misses the room, even stripped down to bare wallpaper and blank spaces where things used to be. He bitterly misses food in the refrigerator. Take-out sucks, too.

Right now, everything sucks.

"Clark?" Hands pull against his, and Clark lets go, leaning his head back on the cushions to stare at the ceiling. His back aches and there's the beginnings of a stress headache settling right behind his eyes. It's one of the few, few times he misses invulnerability. Superman never had stress headaches.

Gentle fingers smooth over the line of his brow, slow and careful, hands that know him too well, know where the pain settles and know how to urge it away. There's a distinct lack of noise going on, which means that the movers have taken time to witness the unutterable cuteness of the president-elect comforting his put-upon husband.

"What are you thinking?" Lex murmurs, and Clark sighs, letting his eyes fall closed.

"I wish we had more time." It feels like everything's moved too fast, even if it really hasn't. Being prepared, though, isn't the same as being ready, and Clark's never been close to being ready for this, no matter how inevitable it's been since the day Lex announced his decision.

"I know." There's the slightest edge on the calm voice. Clark opens one eye, but Lex isn't looking at him. There's a familiar tightness around the mobile mouth. "Clark--"

He's been whiney, maybe. He's tired, definitely He wants nothing more than to go to bed, preferably with Lex, curl up under the covers, and wake up tomorrow with only a Senator for a husband and no moving in sight. The biggest decision whether he goes with the article on corporate corruption or the peace efforts in the Middle East. Doris will have dinner ready when he gets home, he'll gets the usual phone call from Lex saying he'll be late, and Clark falls asleep watching old eighties horror movies on the couch.

*I-want* could be his middle name.

"I better get back to work." Carefully, he dislodges Lex, sitting up and straightening his shirt, aware of stranger eyes that quickly turn back to the task at hand. No familiar eyes of their staff, or the halcyon days of yore when 'staff' referred to Doris and the firm that occasionally sent over people to clean up after them or before one of Lex's interminable dinner parties. Even, and it's a guilty thought, buried deep in Clark's mind, before any of this, when they were still in separate apartments and Clark could drop on his ratty couch in his boxers and eat corn straight out of the can with his fingers if he felt like it.

Not that he did, but it was the principle of the matter.

"Clark." In a liquid movement, Lex is beside him, fingers wrapped around his wrist. "Let's talk--"

"No. I'm just--jittery." It's the understatement of the century. From somewhere, Clark forces a bright smile. "Did you want to meet for dinner?"

Lex doesn't look convinced, mouth opening to reply, only to shut tight when he realizes they have an audience. So movers in the house aren't an entire waste. Lex would never dream of carrying on an argument in front of strangers. "I have a meeting. It may run late--"

"I'll drop in on Chloe and see if she's free. I have a few things at her apartment I need to pick up." The airy room seems too small--all these people, and Lex, who looks so blank that Clark can only hope he cools down before they talk again. Leaning over, Clark brushes a kiss over smooth skin, moving too fast for Lex to even try to stop him. "I'll see you later."

He fishes the keys out of his pocket on his way to the door, grabbing the jacket he'd discarded over the covered couch when he came in. He doesn't look back--his nerves won't stand up to it.

Outside, he thinks he could have taken a car, but a cab feels more reliable, and walking feels even better. He knows Lex's security is behind him, and that he's being quietly cursed for being so fucking ridiculous, but that's okay, that's what they get paid for. Follow around Lex's partner, consort, spouse, whatever the papers are calling it these days, make sure he doesn't fall over his own shoelaces or something and get bruised.

Jesus, *now* he sounds like the petulant sixteen year old he'd forgotten that still sometimes crawled out from beneath his skin. Spoiled. And so tired. Clark can't remember when he wasn't, when he woke up and actually looked forward to the day to come. Meetings and parties and *people*, Christ, the sheer number, constantly surrounding him, them, like a cloud of flies, watching him, watching Lex, watching everything, and--Jesus--

"Clark?"

Clark comes to a short stop, trying to identify the soft feminine voice in front of him, almost smiling when Lana slides up the brim of her hat, a surprised smile curving her lips. "Lana? Aren't you supposed to be packing or something?"

Lana's mouth tightens briefly, and Clark wonders if she's been feeling her latter day teenage years as well. "Pete handled it. I just needed a break. Some kind of meeting-" She stops, maybe when she sees his expression. "Right. Forgot who I was talking to. I need coffee. Want to grab some with me?"

Clark can't help it then--the leashed desperation looks too much like himself in the mirror these days. "You walked all this way for coffee?"

She motions behind her. "Took a car. Got bored with driving and nowhere to go." Too many places they just can't go in Metropolis right now. All the ways that being married to great men just fucks up so many, many things. "I was going to stop by, but--well. Here you are."

Clark nods, looking up in time to see his security consulting with her security. Damien on his has been dating Cheryl on hers. They've become a kind of security matchmakers. The first couple, introduced during that bomb scare last year, had gotten married a few months ago. Clark remembers the wedding had been great, if you ignored how many of the guests came armed. "Yeah." Taking her arm, he thinks of Secret Service, who still aren't as adapted to his weirdness as Lex's people. "Membe's? There won't be anyone there this time of day."

In other words, customers won't have to be cleared out. Clark gives the order, still feeling that strange frisson of sheer *weirdness* doing it, matching his stride to Lana's automatically. She feels small, and he could swear she's lost weight. He almost comments on it, then bites his tongue, remembering the last time, recognizing now what the soft circles under her eyes mean, the restless tension, the fragile feel of her beneath his hands.

She must have miscarried again.

"So ready for the move?" he hears himself say, inanely, like that's anything they want to talk about. There's no safe subject these days. He supposes complaining about Lex and Pete might be as close as they get.

"The house is packed up. Lucy's going to do the rest after we leave." Biting her lip, she stares at the ground. The thick winter coat's plain, and he realizes she's wearing jeans, her distinctive hair braided back from her face, the hat pulled low on her forehead. As disguises go, it's not that great, but it's probably as close as she can get these days. She's too pretty, too distinctive, to not be noticed for long. Clark's had years learning to blend into the background, and even he has problems these days. "You?"

"Mostly done." He's not sure what else to say about it, really. It's nothing she doesn't know, nothing she doesn't feel already, nothing that he can tell her that's going to be new and strange and interesting. This is the life they share, the one they chose, and damned if there's any way they can get around that. "I hate Washington."

It comes out so suddenly he doesn't have time to think of biting back the words. Beneath his arm, she stiffens, then the dark head tilts up, fixing him with huge, blank eyes, her public face, the one he hates more than anything else. Before he can think of something else--anything else--someone's holding the door open and a very nice, overawed woman is asking what they want.

"Coffee, black," Lana says, going to a far corner table, and Clark seconds it, following her, feeling huge and clumsy and stupid. Security fans around them--far enough away to pretend they can't hear a thing, close enough to stop whatever threats could be imminent in a out of the way coffee shop. Terrorists from the ceiling, Clark supposes. It could happen.

The coffee comes faster than Clark expects, and that's good, because the awkward silence is stretching uncomfortably, and it gives them both something to do. He overkills with the cream and sugar, and she does the same, coffee turning the same soft golden-brown as her skin. They both drink like these are martinis at a fundraiser.

Clark wonders a little uncomfortably if that comparison is really one he wants to make.

"I hate it too." Her voice is so low he can barely hear it. "You're not the only one."

Watching her hands twist, the bright gold of her wedding ring, the sparkle of her diamond engagement ring, he wonders again why she withdrew her petition for a divorce, what sent her back to Pete. She'd been so sure, when they'd talked; she'd been planning on expanding her business, maybe taking a vacation abroad, start painting again. She was a terrible artist, but it made her happy like few things did.

"It's a sewer," she whispers, and somehow, her low voice makes it sound almost sweet. She's sure she'd hate to know that, too. "He--I didn't think." She stops, lifting her head. "When he first said he wanted to, I didn't think--not until he ran with Lex. When--when Lex asked." The slim fingers clench on the surface of the table, stretching out like a cat's, and Clark wonders if he's ever seen her this tense before. "I knew when Lex asked, that you would win." The corner of her mouth twists up. "That *we* would win. Lex's never lost anything he really wanted."

Even you, she doesn't say. You walked away once, but you came *back*.

"Lana--" Reaching across the table, he wants to touch her hand, but his hovers, inches above. "I know."

"We both knew." The smile twists more. "I married a lawyer, an activist. He wanted to change the world. He wanted to fight corporations for the little guy." The mocking lilt hurts to hear. "That's what he told me. The night he asked to marry me."

Well, Clark doesn't have that excuse for discontent.

"When--when we reconciled--God I hate that word, reconciled. Like it was so simple." Her eyebrows push into a frown, lavender bruises beneath her eyes. "He said, he said he couldn't live without me. That he needed me. That nothing was worth anything without me. That politics were over, as soon as his term was up--but that didn't happen, either. He never needed me for anything but a trophy."

That's not true--Clark remembers those days, Pete's grief and anger and every frustrated word. "He loves you."

Lana looks up from her stare at the battered wood of the table. "No, he doesn't. He loves what I represent, what I can be with him, and he loves how well we work together, how good we are. And no one else can be that for him, even--."

Her eyes fix on him, hard and sharp, and Clark sees something unfamiliar in them. Evaluative and hurt so deep he thinks he can feel it, too; impossible to look away from. "Lana?"

"You really don't know, do you?"

This conversation has gone places he never expected, and it's still going somewhere he's not sure he can follow.

"Lex knows." Her mouth tightens, looking away. "I guess--I thought he would tell you. Everyone knows. Everyone around us, anyway."

"Knows *what*?"

Her hand fumbles for her purse, dragging out her cellphone, manicured nails playing with the cool silver metal. He realizes her hands are shaking. "Lana, tell me. What?"

For some reason, Clark flashes on the conversation they had a few days ago. Their personal guest lists for the inauguration, going over the names on the phone, since Lana was flying back from Phoenix and wouldn't be home until late. There'd been silence then, matching the silence now, her voice heavy and soft on the phone as she answered, yes, the list was complete, and that she had to go.

"There's someone else," Lana says softly, and Clark remembers something else, teasing at the edges of his mind, trying to draw up, but he's not sure he wants to know.

"Do you know who?"

Lana's eyes flash away. "Yes."

Jesus. No. "Since--how long?"

"Off and on since before I filed for divorce."

Clark runs through a mental list of every woman he's seen Pete with, since that irritating affair with Lydia that still makes Clark's teeth hurt to think about. Probably a body memory of every time his jaw clenched seeing them together in public, acting like acquaintances that weren't fucking every chance they got, Lydia's disparaging remarks on Lex, Pete's barely concealed dislike, all circling together to make Clark's first real experience with post-party migraines.

Nothing's coming up, just their friends, their staff, Pete's campaign manager, Lois, Chloe, a few business associates. No one that Clark doesn't know well, and God, Pete's been discreet. Or Clark's just not noticed.

He's good at that.

"Lana--"

For a second, her face crumples like paper, and Clark knows she wasn't coming to see him tonight, she was walking, like he was, needing space and time in ways he didn't. Of all the things he'd every had to worry about with Lex, fidelity had never been one of them.

"I have to go." Phone in hand, she stands up, almost stumbling to get away from the chair. "I'll see you after the move--"

"Lana, stop." He's already on his feet, but Lana's too far from him, dragging her coat back around her like armor against him, turning away too quickly for him to follow. "Lana--"

"I'll call you." She might have picked up some superpowers herself, slipping out the door with her security trailing her like the tail of a comet.

Left standing alone in the coffee shop, Clark almost sighs, fumbling in his jacket for his phone. Staring at it, he thinks a few minutes, then turns to Damien, seated only a few feet away. "I need a car."


Driving blindly through Metropolis hadn't done much for Lana, but it did good things for Clark, and he picks up chicken on the way home, wondering if Lex is back from whatever the hell meeting was going on. It's climbing one and both of them need their sleep.

God, does Lex need sleep. Clark sometimes wonders if he even *does*, meteor-rock health aside. Clark's woken too many nights to Lex tapping on his computer, reading the latest polls, plotting out the next strategy with Ronald, who Clark honestly believes doesn't sleep at all. Ronald amuses him--he doesn't like Lex, doesn't really care for Clark, and dislikes the name Luthor.

But to watch him, to see him in action, to read what he says in public, you'd think Ronald was his best friend from birth.

It's no different tonight, when security lets Clark in, and Lex is up in pajama bottoms and his half-buttoned dress shirt on the phone, tie wrapped around one fist, like it caught him in the middle of undressing. His briefcase seems to have exploded, papers everywhere on the bed, and Lex is pacing the length of unoccupied floor, looking like a refugee camp survivor.

Lex this focused is easy to slide by, and Clark keeps out of direct line of sight, leaving the chicken on the kitchen counter before sidling into the room, crossing to the dresser to grab underwear and nightclothes, slipping by farther to get to the bathroom door. Once inside, he shuts the door before turning on the light, stripping quickly. A glimpse at the mirror stops him cold.

It sometimes hits him--time had stopped, for all intents and purposes, when he was twenty and reached his full growth, and only started again. It's strange to see change when for years there weren't any. Not just the razor cut hair or the clothes, but the changes in his body that age brings. Eventually, his body might catch up to his chronological age. Sometimes, when he looks too long, he thinks of forty, fifty, when grey hair will feather his temples, lines around his eyes and mouth.

Ageing. A very human thing to do.

Shaking himself free, Clark slides into the shower, closing his eyes at the first beat of hot water--riding that edge between too-hot and just-enough, almost burning but not quite. Clark-before hadn't ever really appreciated the range of water temperatures the way he did now. He remembers, grinning, all the times a cold shower had actually been *cold*, the first time he burned himself on hot water.

Picking up the shampoo, Clark ducks under the water, wetting his hair. Over the spray, he can't hear Lex's voice, but he can guess what he's saying. This law, that act, all the billion things that Lex wants to do in office, the billion ways he's already planning his first four years. With Lex in this mood, there's a good chance that Clark could actually get to bed and fall asleep without Lex noticing until he goes looking for the papers buried under Clark's body.

Years ago, Lex might have joined him. Considering the trouble Lex took to install this shower, Clark might have thought Lex would remember that more often. But no. That was Before the Presidency, or really, Before the Campaign, or to be really honest, a Really Fucking Long Time Ago, and if Clark could sound more like a disgruntled housewife mourning the end of romance, it could only happen if he was actually quoting Redbook.

Rubbing at his temples, Clark dismisses thoughts of Lana and Pete, focusing on the future. Moving. All the packing he's been avoiding. His parents? Also avoiding. Not deliberately, and it's not like a total mystery that Lex is going to Washington and taking Clark with him. It's just not something that comes up over Sunday dinner these days. Or, well, ever.

Clark rubs an absent hand over his face. He wasn't going to think about this tonight.

Over the rush of water, Clark can hear the sound of the door opening. "When did you get home?"

So. He noticed. "A few minutes ago." Ducking back under the water, Clark rinses his hair and pulls back the door just enough to see the slim figure lounging elegantly against the sink. At some point, he'd remembered his shirt, and the tie was no longer strangling one hand, but the phone sat beside him on the counter. God knew what horror would occur if Lex was away from his phone for even a second, or long enough to talk to Clark.

Lex didn't look angry, but neutral was about as bad, a professional politician's look, and Clark misses the days when he could read Lex like a book. A book written in a dead language, but a book nonetheless. "Feel better?"

Clark's not sure how to answer that question. "Did you eat yet?"

Lex's eyebrows arch, but he shakes his head. Not unexpected. "Not yet."

"There's chicken in the kitchen." Fried fast food, in a bucket. Clark doesn't think he's going to get a lot of fast food in the White House. "I'll be out in a minute."

Lex might have argued once. Clark listens to the door close and almost sighs before ducking back under the spray.

A lot of things are different, Clark thinks, padding into the dark kitchen still drying his hair. Lex has made considerable headway into the chicken, though, having found butter from the almost-barren refrigerator and attacking the biscuits. A plate and glass are already set out for him across from Lex.

"Hey."

A glance up, over a half-picked bone, blue eyes so mild that Clark's instantly worried. For some reason, Clark flashes on Lana's eyes, old hurt and even older resignation, and he wonders if he'll ever have that look, or if he has it now.

"I went for a drive." Clark pauses, picking out the last chicken leg from the bottom of the bucket. "Lana and I had coffee."

Clark thinks he must have imagined the second of hesitation before Lex nods, eyes turning back down to eating. Clark wonders what Lex's last meal was. Probably coffee at the office. "How is she?"

*Lex knows. I guess--I thought he would tell you. Everyone knows. Everyone around us, anyway*

Clark shakes the thought away. He doesn't want to know. "Tired."

Lex nods, eyes flickering back up. "You want to tell me what's going on?"

"Pre-move nerves?" With a sigh, Clark picks up a biscuit. "I'm tired, that's all."

"You should have gone with Lois."

Clark stares at him across the short length of the kitchen table. "Yes, I'm sure a week wandering through the Middle East would have done *wonders* for my nerves. Why didn't I think of that?"

Lex's mouth tightens, dropping the denuded chicken bone with another frown, a patient frown, a 'my partner is being unreasonable yet I must comfort him' frown, and Clark's so tired of seeing those that it's tempting to see just how hard he can throw a chicken leg. "Clark--"

"I know. I know, I'm handling it badly. I know, this is not all new shit, I know, I've known since we started dating that we would end up here. It's just--" Rubbing his forehead, Clark tries to find the right words. There aren't any. He's known this was coming. And he's being an ass on what's pretty much their last night as relatively private citizens. Knowing, however, doesn't change anything. It's still hard.

Fingers brush over his, and Clark looks up, and if Lex has that look again, Clark *will* be throwing chicken legs, no matter how juvenile it is, but it's not that at all. Just that touch, and that look, that private look, the one that always makes Clark ache and smile at the same time.

"I know."

Clark takes a deep breath, letting Lex's fingers twine around his. "Let's go to bed."

It won't change anything. Tomorrow, Metropolis won't be home anymore, not for years. In a few days, Lex will be president, and Clark will be in the White House, surrounded by more security than he can imagine, but that won't be entirely new, he's been surrounded by security for years. But tomorrow isn't now.

He lets Lex tuck him into bed, watches Lex go about his strange, anal-retentive pre-bed routine, which is still just funny, no matter how many times Clark's watched it happen. Then a slow slide into bed, warm body and even warmer hands that slide over his skin, familiar and comforting.

Lex's voice, low in his ear. "What are you thinking?"

Clark grins. "Tell me again what we'll do the night before inauguration."

"Oh, that."

"Yes, 'oh, that'." Clark grins at the hard press of silk against his thigh. So Lex is thinking about it. So far so good. Settling himself more comfortably, Clark closes his eyes. "Tell me."

"Paperwork."

Clark turns his head sharply, staring into amused blue eyes. "This is me, who is going to sleep and leaving you with *that*." And maybe it's mean, but that's fine, Clark feels mean right now, reaching down to slide the heel of his hand over hard flesh, just beneath too-thin silk. Lex makes a low sound in the back of his throat.

"Clark."

"*Lex*."

"You manipulative little bastard."

Clark smiles back. "But you like that about me."

"In the oval office--" Lex's hands are working up the edge of his shirt.

"Did we work out how exactly we were getting by security or possible press yet?"

The hand that's moving beneath his shirt jerks out. "Jesus, Clark--"

"Never mind. What will you do?"

Teeth graze the side of his throat. "I'm going to fuck you."

Clark rolls his eyes. "You're not so great at this sex talk thing, you know."

Then Lex is on top of him, one of those liquid, disconcertingly fast movements that always make Clark wonder, just a little, if Lex got more from the meteor shower than he's ever admitted to. It's hot. And even better when that perfect mouth is against his ear. "I'm so much better at doing."

The hand around his cock's good--Clark's with that, breathing through quick fingers that seem to touch everything at once--sliding up the length, circling the head, pressing gently just behind his balls and making him tense, shivering at every too-gentle touch, like Lex is teasing him, just wanting to play, and Clark's so far beyond play it's not even funny. Reaching up, he curves a hand around Lex's neck, have to get to his mouth, soft and wet, licking the line of Lex's scar, slipping just inside with the softest pressure against his tongue before pulling back. Glazed blue eyes and quickened breath--Clark's liking this. "I'm going to blow you in that office, you know."

He can feel Lex's cock, rubbing distractedly against his hip, hard and damp, and pushes up against him. "You can sit there with your paperwork, and you can break a pen when I take you in my mouth."

Lex's breath catches, blue eyes dilated to an electric circle of blue.

"You didn't even know I was there. There are people outside--maybe Ronald. And they want to come in and do whatever the fuck it is you need to be doing, and you see me on my knees under your desk and you realize the door isn't even locked.

"They're out there, the door's unlocked, and you can't do a damn thing to stop me. You don't even want to."

It happened like that, once. Lex's LexCorp office, and Clark, finished with a story, a little drunk from Lois' celebratory brandy, a little high from lack of sleep. Lex had a slow breakdown on a conference call to Turkey. Two lawyers sat across the desk from Lex and to this day never knew why Lex Luthor told them they could do whatever they damned well pleased with the new company, just get the fuck *out*.

Clark pushes Lex onto his back, straddling him. "You can't even answer the phone when it rings. You just sit there, hoping to God they don't hear you, hear me, hear *us*."

Sliding back, Clark pulls the pajamas down, just enough, letting his fingers linger on warm, hard flesh, just to hear Lex moan. Yes. This. "And then I'll do this."

Lex is easy. He likes sex. He likes sex with Clark. And he loves Clark's mouth, murmurs poetry devoted to nothing but the quick movements of his tongue, his lips, and it's kind of funny and pretty fucking cool, all things considered, that all it takes is this, Clark bent over Lex's cock, swallowing him down, to make Lex yell.

Like *this*, licking just beneath the head, easing him back to breathe, like *that*, taking a breath and swallowing him down, holding him in his throat, hips pushed up, back arched, saying things that stopped making sense a while ago. Hard fingers twisting into his hair, but carefully, because there was that time with the pulling and the teeth, and Lex won't be forgetting that anytime soon.

Lex is so easy, or maybe it's Clark, who's fucked him for years and knows almost everything. How he likes the gentle trace of Clark's fingers over his balls, the press just behind for a few long, blissful seconds. Coming back up, Clark sucks his finger into his mouth, letting Lex watch, letting him see it, then grins, taking just the head in his mouth, sucking gently. Pushing up Lex's thigh, just enough to slide a hand down beneath, press a finger against him, pushing inside the second he goes down again, fast and hard, both at once, and Lex is too keyed up to even try to make it last, coming with a surprised yell and Clark smiles to himself.

Swallowing and just holding for a few seconds, then sits up, tucking the pajamas back up and sprawling on the bed, listening to Lex pant beside him.

When Lex finally looks at him, Clark grins. "That night? It'll be just like that."

Tomorrow, they move and start a new life in a place Clark's almost sure he hates, and tomorrow, they'll see Pete and Lana, and Clark will think of Lana's face and her words, think of Ronald and how very much he hates the way the man treats him like an idiot, think of all the ways their lives are never going to belong to them again.

But tomorrow's not tonight, and tomorrow's not now, and Clark's learned how to forget when he needs to.

"So." Settling himself on one elbow, Clark slides a hand over his own cock, shivering at the feeling, the flare of something hot and dangerous in Lex's eyes when he looks back. "Show me what you'll do to me."

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