Wading In

Clark/Chloe
Pre-season 1
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: These characters belong to the CW and DC Comics, not to me.
Based on a prompt by excelaunt: How about Clark tries to teach Chloe to swim?

"Come on in. The water's nice and warm."

"Thanks. But I'm perfectly fine here."

Clark Kent dove under the water, then exploded out of the pond, spraying droplets everywhere. He shook his head like a dog, flinging more water in all directions, and looked at his friend Chloe Sullivan with amusement.

"Come on, Chlo. Your knees aren't even getting wet."

She frowned at the water. "Are you sure it's safe?"

"Safe?" Treading water, he cocked his head and looked at her. "Free of toxins from the LuthorCorp plant, you mean? I think so. My family's been swimming here for years, Chlo. Since before I was born, even."

"Yeah, but..." She frowned more deeply than before. An adorable crease appeared between her golden eyebrows. "What about leeches?"

He laughed. "There are no toxins and no leeches, Chloe. There aren't any jellyfish or sharks, either. Now come on in."

She took another, very hesitant step forward. He watched her with interest as he continued to tread water. He'd met her about six months ago, halfway into their eighth grade year, and even though summer break had only started a couple of weeks ago, the two of them had already spent a lot of time together. When he'd first met Chloe, she'd been skinny as a rail and flat as a board, but the bikini she wore made it clear that she wasn't quite as skinny now.

Not that she was fat. Not at all. But there was a flare to her hips, and a certain, well, curve to her chest that hadn't been there before.

And if he was going to be perfectly honest, that was the reason he'd asked her to the swimming hole on his farm. Because he'd wanted to see her in a swimsuit.

He hadn't imagined he'd be lucky enough that she'd wear a bikini. But she had, and he was happy about it, because the view was very impressive. Even her belly button was sexy. Just looking at it made him feel, well...

He dove under the water again, because he could feel his eyeballs starting to bulge out of their sockets, and he didn't want to make her uncomfortable. Besides, there was a weird hot, itchy sensation in his eyes that the water helped to cool.

When he broke the surface, she was still standing there, looking more worried than ever. He hovered in the water, treading water, and looked at her with a frown of his own.

"Chloe, can you swim?"

"Um." She looked down at the water. "Well, you know, I just haven't... we never had a pool, and my dad couldn't afford the YMCA, and..."

"So that's a no."

She nodded, very slightly, looking embarrassed.

"Well, that's no big deal. I'll teach you."

She looked up, and her eyes brightened. "You would do that?"

"Sure." It occurred to him that he could use this as an opportunity to get his hands all over her, but he decided it was better not to say so. "I spend a lot of time down here, Chlo. If we're going to hang out this summer, you really need to learn how to swim."

"Okay," she said, and the bright, joyous smile he loved to see spread over her face. "So teach me."

He paddled over to shallow water, stood up, and grinned at her.

"The first thing you have to do is actually come into the water."

*****

Half an hour later, she was in the water, but she wasn't swimming. He had his hands on her waist, attempting to hold her in the right position, but she was clearly nervous, and she felt stiff as a board.

"Relax," he told her for the two hundredth time. "Just relax and move your arms and legs like I showed you, and you'll be fine."

"Or I'll drown."

"I'm standing right here," he said reasonably. "I'm not going to let you drown, Chlo. I won't have anyone to watch old episodes of Twilight Zone with if I do."

He heard a chuckle, and beneath his hands, she relaxed very slightly. Her flesh felt nice against his palms, soft and strangely touchable. He wondered what it would feel like to touch her somewhere else, like on those pretty new curves on her chest...

Stop it, he told himself sharply.

She tried to paddle, and instantly stiffened up again. He sighed.

"Chlo," he said, "I think maybe you need to get over your fear of the water first."

She stood up, the water almost to her shoulders, and glared at him. "I'm not scared!"

"Uh-huh," he said, unconvinced. It was true that Chloe Sullivan wasn't scared of much, but she was clearly freaked out by the water. "Maybe you're just kind of... uncomfortable. But I think we need to deal with that first."

She frowned. "How?"

"Like this," he said, and grabbed her.

*****

She squealed and clung to his neck as he waded out deeper into the water. He really liked the feel of her clinging to him, but he decided not to say that, either. She held on, shivering, and pressed her face into his skinny chest.

"D-d-d-don't drop me."

Poor thing. She really was scared. He squeezed her a little.

"I won't drop you," he said softly. "I'd never let anything hurt you, Chlo."

She lifted her head and looked at him. There was a trickle of moisture on her lips from where she'd pressed against his wet chest. The rest of her was wet, too. Her.... curves... rose just above the water, gleaming with diamond droplets in the sunlight.

Wow. He hadn't really noticed how impressive those curves had become.

The two of them were both growing, both changing. He knew he'd put on a lot of inches since he'd met her. He was still pretty skinny, but his shoulders and chest were starting to fill out a little. His voice had lowered, and he'd begun to notice girls in a big way.

Like the one he was holding in his arms right now.

But Chloe wasn't just any girl. She was like no other girl he knew, snarky and mouthy and with a sardonic sense of humor, but sweet and generous and just plain nice beneath it all. She was way more than just pretty curves and big hazel eyes and a mop of golden hair.

She was... well, she was Chloe.

He realized he was staring at her mouth. He tried to look away, but couldn't. And suddenly he realized she was looking at him, too. It was like the whole world had suddenly shrunk down to this, the two of them standing in a pond, arms wrapped around each other, staring at each other's mouths.

It occurred to him that he really ought to kiss her. So, very slowly, he lowered his head and let his lips brush over hers.

The kiss was awkward, because he'd only kissed a girl-- her, actually-- once before, and he wasn't exactly an expert. But she didn't seem to mind. She tilted her face up, and her lips moved against his.

Suddenly he felt warm, very warm, despite the fact that he was chest-deep in cool water. His eyes felt hot again, but so did the rest of him. Maybe, he thought, it was the summer sun beating down on his shoulders.

Or maybe it was just her.

He wanted to stand here and kiss her forever. He wanted to shift her around a little, so she was pressed right up against him, her curves against his chest, her belly against his abs, her...

Whoa. His mind shied away from the images that were flashing through it. He wasn't ready for all that stuff, and he knew it. Kissing a girl with lips closed was about as much as he thought he could handle right now.

In fact, kissing her with lips closed was pretty much overloading his systems. He felt hot all over, but kind of goosebumpy, too. And his eyes itched again, which was just plain weird.

He wanted to go on kissing her all afternoon, but after a few kisses-- well, okay, about ten kisses-- she caught his face in her hands and pushed him away, gently but firmly. He opened his eyes-- which itched like crazy now-- and looked at her.

"Hey," she said. "Learning to swim, remember?"

Oh. Right. That was why they were standing here in the water, wasn't it? He felt his cheeks flush a little. She obviously wasn't quite comfortable with their relationship shifting to something more than friendly, and he could understand that. He didn't want to blunder ahead full speed and screw things up between them. She meant too much to him.

He thought he'd like to kiss her again... but he also thought they should take it slow.

"Maybe we're going too fast," he said, blinking hard to get rid of the weird itchy sensation. "I mean... you don't have to learn to swim today, Chlo. We've got all summer, after all."

She looked at him, a little smile curving her mouth. "True."

"So maybe we should just... hang out in the shallow water today, so you get comfortable with it. And then you can come back tomorrow, and we can wade in a little deeper, and work on the swimming thing." And other things, his mind added.

Her smile grew brighter. "I'd like that."

That smile was infectious, and he couldn't stop himself from smiling back at her. He turned around and walked back into the shallow water, then lowered her feet and looked down into her eyes. She looked back, and he saw something new in her gaze, something he thought was probably reflected in his own eyes.

Somehow, in the past ten minutes, things had changed between them. He was pretty new at this whole boy-girl thing, and he wasn't quite sure where things were going between them. But he was pretty sure he was going to like this new direction.

He felt his smile broaden as he looked down at her. Suddenly he felt ridiculously, absurdly happy.

And why shouldn't he? After all... he had a whole summer of playing in the pond with Chloe Sullivan to look forward to.

"Yeah," he answered, grinning. "I think it'll be fun."

-The End-