She Loves Me

Clark/Chloe
Season 2
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: These characters belong to the CW and DC Comics, not to me.
Note: This is a rewrite of a scene from "Some Kind of Wonderful" into a Chlark scene. The song and screencap are from the movie, too.

The minutes that we missed
The idle lips that should've kissed
Are now gently together
The first kiss lasts forever

She loves me
She loves me
Oh and she loves me all the time
-"She Loves Me," Stephen Duffy

"Don't think I'm being weird, but what if she wants you to kiss her?"

Clark Kent added a bale of hay to the lopsided juggurat he was creating, then looked over his shoulder, blinking. "You mean like kiss her goodnight?"

"Yeah, genius." His best friend, Chloe Sullivan, was seated on a hay bale a short distance away. She was sitting near the door, in a shaft of sunlight, and dust motes danced around her. "I mean like kiss her goodnight."

Clark frowned. He'd been in love with Lana Lang forever, and she'd finally agreed to go out with him tonight. But he hadn't ever really considered the possibility that she might actually want to kiss him. "Well then," he said, trying to sound casual about it, "I guess I'm just going to have to kiss her."

She rolled her eyes at him, in a familiar, comfortable gesture: You're dumb, Clark, but I like you anyway. "Lana's no minor leaguer who'll be swept off her feet by your amateur lips."

"Gosh, thanks," he said dryly, adding another bale to the pile. Ordinarily he could have done this chore in five seconds flat, but with Chloe here, he had to do it the slow way. Not that he minded. Chloe was his best friend, and he liked her company.

"I'm serious. This girl has plenty of battle scars. I mean, she was dating Whitney last year, Clark. Whitney Fordman. A senior, captain of the football team, president of his class..."

"I get the picture, Chlo. She was dating the most popular guy in school, and I'm just a hick farmboy."

"That's about the size of it, yeah."

"I appreciate your efforts to boost my ego," he said dryly. "But don't worry about it. I think I can handle it."

She studied him, bright-eyed, her short blonde hair tousled. A piece of hay had drifted through the air as he worked, and now rested on top of her hair. It was cute, he thought. "Okay," she said. "But I just think maybe you should consider whether or not you can deliver a kiss that kills."

He was in the process of picking up another bale, but he dropped it back down and frowned at her. "What, you think I can't?"

She shrugged with elaborate unconcern. "If you say you can, you probably can."

He heard the disbelief in her voice, and it rankled. But the truth was, he didn't really know much about kissing. In fact, the only girl he'd kissed was Chloe, and that was a couple of years ago, when they'd been just kids.

"Well," he admitted, "I'm no expert..."

She shrugged, and got up off her hay bale. He watched as she wandered across the barn aisle. Her butt moved smoothly beneath her tight jeans-- not that he was looking at her butt or anything. He'd just happened to glance down.

"It's cool," she said, plopping down on a stool and depriving him of the view of her butt in denim. "I was just going to work on it with you, but if you're comfortable... great."

"Hold on," he said.

She cocked a golden eyebrow.

"Um..." he said. "How exactly do you work on it?"

She grinned at him. "Pretend I'm a girl."

His mouth opened, but no words came out.

She sighed, and her expression turned a little more serious. "I mean... pretend I'm her. Lana. I know it's a big stretch, but try it."

Still he stood there gaping, and her mouth curved in a humorless smile. "Come here," she said, more gently. "I didn't mean to scare you."

For some reason, his mouth felt really dry. "All right," he croaked, and walked toward her.

He paused right in front of her and looked down at her, feeling stupid and awkward. Not an expert, he realized, was a huge understatement. He had absolutely no clue how to properly kiss a girl. One childish buss two years ago hadn't taught him much.

"So," she said, sounding brisk and detached, as if she gave kissing lessons every day of the week. "What do you do with your hands?"

"Uh," he said, thinking about it, trying to visualize it in his head. "Uh, well, that depends..."

"No, it doesn't depend," she answered tartly. "They go on her hips."

He stood frozen. The image of his hands on Chloe's hips made something inside him ache. No... the image of his hands on Lana's hips. Because they were talking about kissing Lana here, right? He and Chloe were just friends, and he wasn't in the least interested in kissing her.

Really. He wasn't.

"Okay," she ordered. "Do it."

Her tone was bossy, like it all too often was. She was eleven inches shorter than he was, and a hundred pounds lighter, but she bossed him around unmercifully, and most of the time he let her. Obediently, he moved his hands, dropping them onto the curve of her hips. She felt soft and touchable underneath his hands, and he barely resisted the urge to squeeze a little.

"Look into my eyes."

He tried to gaze into her eyes, but the ridiculousness of the situation suddenly hit him, and he snorted.

Looking aggravated, she tried to yank away from him. "Look," she said fiercely, "I'm just trying to help you out here. I don't have to do this, you know."

He dug his fingers into her hips, just a bit, and held her fast. He tried to look meekly apologetic. "I know. I'm sorry."

"Just grow up a little," she chided him, and slid her arms around his neck. The sensation of her warm, soft arms sliding over the sensitive skin of his neck sent a shiver through him, which he did his best to suppress. "She'll probably do this."

He liked this a lot. She was very close to him now, her lips only inches away from hers, and her warm, soft body was near, too, and... well.

He dragged his mind away from the paths it seemed to be wandering, and frowned at her.

"How do you know?"

She rolled her eyes again. "I watch a lot of TV."

He wasn't sure if she was being sarcastic. With Chloe, it was hard to tell. He'd rather think all her knowledge of kissing came from TV, rather than from personal experience, but he knew she'd definitely kissed a boy or two. The thought made an unexpected heat bloom in his chest. It took him a moment to realize it was jealousy.

"Close your eyes."

She was still being bossy, and he was still going along with it. Obediently, he closed his eyelids and stood there, feeling kind of silly. Was he supposed to lean down and kiss her now?

He stood there, frozen, uncertain what to do. But as it turned out, he didn't need to do anything, because she leaned up, and her lips brushed over his.

Suddenly he wasn't frozen any more. Strange new instincts rose up inside him, churning in his chest, telling him exactly what to do. He leaned into the kiss, and his lips moved on hers, exploring, caressing.

Vaguely, he was aware of her calf sliding around his thighs, pulling him closer. He tightened his grip on her, squeezing her butt. She felt soft and warm, and she tasted so good...

He deepened the kiss, letting his tongue slide gently against hers, and suddenly she was pushing him away and jumping off the stool. She skittered across the barn, looking as spooked as a horse that had just spotted a rattlesnake.

He blinked at her, bewildered. She'd been in his arms, kissing the hell out of him, and now suddenly she was acting like he was armed and dangerous. "What's wrong?"

She squared her shoulders and made a very obvious effort to pull herself together. But her eyes still looked scared. "Lesson's over," she said curtly. "You're cool."

He looked at her, and despite himself he couldn't stop the smile from curving his mouth. "You're blushing."

She snorted. "Yeah, right. The day I blush--"

She turned around to go, and he realized he was losing her. And he didn't want to lose her. He wanted to kiss her again.

Which was wrong, because he was going out with Lana tonight. This had been supposed to just be a practice kiss.

But it had felt like so much more.

He went after her, holding out a hand. "Chloe... that was really nice."

She turned on him, her eyes blazing, and he realized the word "nice" had offended her. It wasn't the right word, anyway. It had been a lot more than nice. It had been hot as hell. He tried to get across some hint of his feelings. "You're-- you're pretty."

Her lips drew back from her teeth in a dangerous snarl. "This is how you repay a favor?"

He wasn't quite sure why she took that as an insult. But thinking it over, he did know why. He remembered her earlier words: Pretend I'm a girl.

Lana was the most popular girl in school, and everyone thought she was the most beautiful, too. Chloe felt like she wasn't as pretty as Lana. At least, she thought he thought so.

And maybe he hadn't actually noticed how pretty she was till now. Yeah, they'd gone out once or twice, but the truth was, he'd been a little afraid of letting himself think of her as more than a friend. Because he couldn't live without Chloe snarking at him on a daily basis, and if they dated, and something went wrong, well...

Maybe, he thought, he'd focused on Lana because he was a little scared of losing Chloe.

She turned again, and began to stalk out of the barn. He went after her, at slightly more than human speeds, since her back was turned, and caught her right at the door, wrapping his hand firmly around her wrist.

"Wait," he said, looking down into her eyes. "I didn't mean anything."

She looked up into his eyes, then looked away.

"I know you didn't," she said softly. "That's the problem."

There was a world of sorrow in her voice, and it caught at his heart. For the first time, he realized how much Chloe Sullivan felt for him. He'd always known she had feelings for him, but at last it dawned on him that she didn't just have a crush on him.

She loved him.

He thought of the way they'd both kept friendship as a kind of barrier between them, never taking a chance on each other. He thought of how happy he'd been when she'd agreed to go with him to the spring formal last year, and yet how strangely relieved he'd been when she'd blown him off the next day, resetting their relationship to friendship mode.

He realized he was genuinely terrified of losing her. And maybe, he thought, that meant he loved her, too.

"I'm sorry," he said gently. "Don't be mad, okay?"

"I'm not mad." And in fact she didn't sound mad. She sounded defeated.

He looked down at her, and blurted out the honest truth-- a truth he'd been avoiding for a long time.

"Chlo, I don't want to go out with Lana tonight. I want to go out with you."

She blinked up at him. "Excuse me?"

"You heard me," he said, staring at her intently. "Want to go out with me?"

"But-- but--" She sputtered, then pulled herself together. "Clark, you're crazy. The girl of your dreams has just agreed to go out with you."

He smiled down at her.

"No, she hasn't," he said. "Not yet."

She stared up at him, as if searching his eyes for his real feelings. What she saw there must have reassured her, because he could feel her relax a little beneath his hand.

"But I thought..."

"Yeah," he admitted. He noticed the piece of hay was still in her hair, and reached up to brush it away. "So did I. But I was wrong."

She blinked hard, as if she had an eyelash in her eye. "Okay," she said, a little gruffly. "I'll see you tonight, then."

He smiled. "I'm glad," he said.

And then he bent and kissed her again.

And this time... she didn't run away.

-The End-