By Shakespeare's Girl

"Where two raging fires do meet, they do consume the thing that fuels their fury."-The Taming of the Shrew.

Lex Luthor sat behind his desk, a barely contained fire raging within him. His servants and secretaries all knew to keep far away from him when he was in one of his moods.

I wouldn't get this way if that idiot farm boy didn't abandon mein restraunts to save the world, Lex thought angrily.

Clark Kent's head appeared around the corner of the door. "Lex, I know this is really bad and you are really angry, but please, promise not to throw anything at me!" he pleaded, his words quick, as though he was waiting for something to be chucked forcefully at his head.

"Why would I want to throw things at you, Clark?" Lex asked, grabbing a paperweight and launching it at Clark the instant he stepped around the door and into the room. The paperweight bounced off Clark's head and fell to the floor, shattering on the hardwood surface. "For abandoning me? For LYING? For leaving me all alone to fly off and SAVE THE WORLD? AGAIN?!"

"Lex, I'm sorry," Clark began, "but--"

"BUT!" Lex stormed, "BUT?" He grabbed a framed picture of himself and Clark and threw it at the broad chest he loved so much it hurt. It hurt so much. Especially when that chest ran off in the middle of dates with Lex to save people. "There's ALWAYS a 'but' with you, Clark! You can never just admit that you fucked something up royally, can you? There's always some assinine reason, some lame excuse for your behavior! If I walked out on you in the middle of a date, you'd never forgive me! There would be no end of evil, manipulative things I'd try to win you back, but no, Clark Kent would remain unmoved."


"DON'T 'LEX' ME!" Lex shouted, pulling a stack of books off the nearest bookshelf and hurling them at Clark. "I'm not done yelling yet!"

Clark shut his mouth, frustrated.

"I give you so much," Lex roared. "I feel like all I do lately is forgive you, and then watch you walk away. And forgive you again, and watch you walk away again, or hurt me or ignore me some other way. I am so sick of this Clark! I can't keep this up any longer. I swear to God, Clark, if you wak out on me one more time, I will kick your ass out and send you back home to Smallville faster than even you think is possible!" Lex paused in his rant to take a breath and Clark jumped in.

"Lex, I think you're absolutely right."

"You--what?" Lex stopped and blinked.

"You're right. This can't keep happening. I can't keep jumping up from dinners and running out of parties to save some kid from a burning building. I can't keep all the bad in the world from happening. It's just not possible."

"So? What do you plan to do about it?"

"Here," Clark said, handing Lex a box that looked suspiciously like lead. "Go ahead, open it."

Lex did, suspiciously. He laughed when he saw what was inside. "Meteorite dust?" Lex asked.

"Just blow some on my food and I'll be too sick to run out on you to go help anyone."

"And also too sick to be any fun," Lex reminded him.

"Oh. Yeah, well. I never said it was perfect."

Lex shut the box gently and handed it back to Clark. "It's a good thought, but don't think I'd be able to purposely hurt you like that."

"So what's going to happen, Lex?" Clark asked.

"I don't know. But my heart can't take this anymore." Lex said it gently.

"Maybe..." Clark swallowed. "Maybe this just wasn't meant to be..."

"Maybe not," Lex agreed.

"I--" Clark faltered. Lex stared, still angry enough to want to watch Clark squirm a little. "You don't have to kick me out, Lex. Because I'll go."

Lex froze. He hadn't expected that.

"I can never stop saving the world," Clark said, answering the unspoken question. "Never. I can't. Not--not even for you, love."

Lex stared at Clark, frozen to the spot where he stood. Surely Clark didn't think--?

"So, I guess this is goodbye."

"Goodbye..." Lex repeated, stunned.

Clark walked out.

Lex sank to the ground, not quite sure what had just happened.

And then he realized. Clark's gone. He just left me. And he thought that's what I wanted him to do. Damn.

"Damn," Lex muttered aloud. "Damn! Oh god, no..."

And as Lex rose from the floor, he knew exactly what he would do to get his Clark back.