Archive of Our Own ^beta

Oh, man!

He didn't dare stand Lex up again, and no he didn't mean "stand up" that way. They were friends, doggone it, no matter what Pete kept saying and Chloe kept hinting at and Lana kept sighing about. Lex was his friend, and he'd taken Clark out to dinner the last two times they'd spent the evening together, and Clark honestly didn't feel like he could let Lex pay again, even for pizza, but the stupid City of Metropolis was full of morons, and every time he almost had it together enough to either take Lex out or even just cook him a pot of spaghetti, the morons went into full moron-mode, and Superman had to save them, which of course meant Clark had to call Lex and cancel and apologize, lamely, again. Nitwits.

They hadn't spent the evening together in three doggone weeks, and Clark wasn't going to let fire (Suicide Slum, four alarms, rescued six crying kids and an old lady from the roof), flood (down by the docks, inferior building materials - how the heck did a customs building just slide into the harbor like that? - saved fourteen bureaucrats and a cat from a watery grave) or crazed gunmen (Second National Bank, right downtown - at least they weren't far from campus) prevent him from having dinner with Lex tonight!

He got back to his dorm room (at least he had a single this year; sharing was excruciating, even with Pete) half an hour before Lex was supposed to arrive. No time to shop. Clark checked out the contents of his "kitchen" cupboard (Let's hear it for the x-ray vision!) while he changed out of his smoke-, bilge- and snot-covered clothes. He had rice, oatmeal, sugar, salt and pepper and a can of SPAM. Terrific. He took a superspeed sponge bath in his dorm room sink while checking the contents of the community fridge down the hall. There were always plenty of Kent Organic Vegetables - other people didn't seem to eat them much, and Mom always made him bring bags full of slightly-irregular or slightly-wilted veggies to school whenever he visited the farm. There were still some okay-looking tomatoes, some green onions, and several heads of cabbage.

Right. They were having dinner, dagnabit.

Clark put two cups of water in his saucepan and set it to boil with his eyes. He dumped in a cup of rice, covered it, and put the pan on his hot-plate set to LOW. Then he combed his hair and got dressed in his least-scuzzy clothes and kicked everything else under the bed. He definitely had to get around to doing his laundry, one of these days. He got some tomatoes, onions, a cabbage, and somebody else's soy sauce out of the fridge and brought them back into his room. He splashed a little stolen soy sauce into a bowl and mixed it with about an equal amount of sugar, then opened the SPAM, cut it up, dumped it in, and started looking for his frying pan. It turned out to be in Chloe's room down the hall, of course. He returned the purloined soy sauce and forced the lock of Chloe's unoccupied room with his library card. He sighed when he saw that she hadn't even washed it, and philosophically swiped her cooking oil.

Fifteen minutes left. Piece of cake - dang! He didn't have anything for dessert! Oh, well. Maybe Lex wouldn't notice. Five minutes to wash the pan and cut up the vegetables, and the rice was okay to take off the heat. He set the hot pan on the sink with the lid still on, to finish, put the frying pan on the hot plate, and cranked it up. Splash of oil, dump in the SPAM, stir it around with his fingers (they were clean enough, and he hadn't searched Chloe's room long enough to find his spatula) add the onions, cook a couple minutes, add the cabbage, five minutes more, add the tomatoes, and there was a knock at the door!

Clark washed his hands super quickly, turned the heat back down to LOW again, and shook some pepper into the pan. He opened the door and grinned. "Lex!"

"Hey," Lex greeted him. He had his hands in his pockets, and he was wearing the smoothest, softest-looking thin sort of a gray sweater thing that clung to his chest like - Hey! Just friends, here!

Friends grinned at each other like maniacs and couldn't stop, right? Especially when they hadn't seen each other in a few weeks - nothing funny there, right? "I'm really glad you could make it, Lex."

Lex gave a really cute tiny little snort of laughter. "I'm not the one who had to keep re-scheduling, Clark. May I come in?"

Clark felt his face go red. That's right, doofus, stand in the doorway so your friend can't even get in - to the room! He backed up, redder than ever, and felt Lex's oh-so-amused smile fall upon him. Lex thought it was funny when Clark blushed. Clark gestured expansively at his friend. "Come in! Please!" He found two bowls and two forks that all seemed clean, and dished out rice and stuff.

Lex accepted a bowl (with an amused look that Clark really liked) and perched gracefully on the edge of Clark's bed. Clark, breathing a little harder than friends maybe usually did, took his own bowl and sat next to him. On the bed. Studying Lex's face, the way friends do, Clark thought he looked kinda tired.

Lex tasted a little of his food, looking slightly dubious, and then smiled. "This is nice. I was really hungry - no time for lunch today."

"You really should eat lunch, Lex!" Clark scolded mildly. He remembered to eat, also. This was nice, sitting together with Lex on the bed, in his room, alone with Lex and the door closed and... "Um!" Clark said suddenly. Friends should have conversation while they ate dinner. "You were busy at work?"

"Yeah, we're getting a new mixing station up and running...." Lex kept talking about fertilizer manufacturing, and Clark just watched the way his face moved. He really liked watching Lex talk, and listening to his voice no matter what he was talking about. Clark noticed Lex's bowl was empty and took it from his friend's unresisting hands.

"Would you like some more?" Clark asked.

"Yes, please. That's pretty good. What's in it?"

"Rice, vegetables, and SPAM."

"You fed me SPAM?!?!"

"Uh, yes?"

"Jeeze, Clark! Okay, I understand that you won't let me pay every time we have dinner together - I've known you for years, I'm used to it. But you fed me SPAM!?!?"

"Um, sorry?" Clark wasn't sure what he'd done wrong, but he had to make it up to Lex somehow, apparently. "I, um...." He set Lex's dish down in the sink instead of refilling it, and moved back to the bed. "Is there, uh, is there anything I can do to make it up to you?"

Lex's eyes were a really unique color, sort of a silvery blue. His skin was really smooth, too. He had the sweetest smile sometimes. "Clark, it's okay, you don't have to...."

Clark cut him off with a kiss. So much for just friends. "But I want to," he said.

"Okay." Lex kissed him back. Wow. That had to be a superpower.

Clark pulled back an inch or so. It was harder than lifting several tons. "Uh, Lex," he panted. "There's a bunch of other stuff I should probably tell you, if we're...."

"Mmmm," Lex said, and licked Clark's ear! "We'll talk later."

Who knew that a tongue in his ear could make Clark forget everything he ever thought was important? "Okay. Yes," Clark said.

They didn't actually talk again until morning. By then they were both in a forgiving mood, and inclined to give each other the benefit of the doubt.

And they all lived happily ever after.