(this was supposed to be more about the teaching, but it kindof got away from me in a different direction. hope you still like it!) ------ Melting the Ice ------
Clark watched glumly as the figures on the small lake laughed and twirled around, effortlessly gliding across the frozen water. Lana was out there, and Whitney, and Chloe, and Pete, and… everybody but him, it seemed.
"Clark, shouldn't you be on the ice?" A husky warm voice, too low-pitched to come out of that slender frame but fitting the speaker just right, like a driving glove over a thin strong hand.
Everybody but him and Lex. Clark turned around happily to greet his friend. "Lex!" He'd thought Lex was still working. It was only the high schoolers who got the snow day off.
"Half my employees had to leave early to go pick up their kids, so I said what the halibut and gave everybody else the rest of the day too." Lex flashed his trademark grin. "That didn't leave me anything to do, so I came here."
Clark's brain finally caught up with his eyes and he registered the ice skates slung over Lex's shoulder. With a sigh, he realized he really would be the only one out on the shore again.
Frowning, Lex put down the ice skates on a nearby log. "Okay, your mood just went from a hundred to negative twenty in less time than my SSC Aero gets to sixty." He walked up to Clark and faced the lake, bumping shoulders with his friend.
Feeling unaccountably happy that his friend was skipping skating to stand in the chilly weather with him, Clark also turned to face the lake, making sure when he turned around that the shoulder contact stayed.
They watched the skaters for awhile, but Clark wasn't really so involved with them anymore. Instead, he listened with his eyes half-closed to the way Lex's breath sounded coming out in the cold air, and how Lex would then breathe in again through his nose. Tree branches crackled as the breezes knocked frozen limbs around, and it was warm where their shoulders and arms touched.
"When I was ten, my dad took me out to an ice-skating rink. First time in my life I'd ever seen that much frozen water in one place," Lex said. "People were gliding all over it, but they weren't laughing like your friends – they were serious. This was the world-class rink where Olympians came to practice. It was all very somber and intense. Very chilling." Lex huffed a little laugh. "So Dad tossed me out there to learn."
"Tossed you out there?" Clark was horrified. Every time Lex came up with one of his little 'past history' lectures, Clark was always torn being laughing and wanting to kidnap Lex home to his family and keep him there and share with him everything a childhood was *supposed* to be.
Lex laughed. "Not literally. Dad had hired the best ex-champions who were willing to teach rich brats, and I learned." He fell silent for a bit. "Never really liked it, though. Always too cold."
Clark edged in a bit closer, moving a bit behind Lex so that he could share more of his body warmth. He'd noticed before that Lex tended to get more cold than other people.
"When I was eight, I fell through the pond," Clark offered.
Lex stiffened in surprise next to him, and then quickly relaxed. Clark thought the relaxed part was forced. "My God, Clark… were you all right?"
"Oh, I was fine," Clark said with a little laugh. Even back then, cold hadn't really affected him. "It was harder, though, to explain to the teachers how I'd fallen through the five feet of ice the pond had built up that year. They finally decided a tree branch had weakened it the night before and I just happened to fall on that one weakened spot." Clark sighed. "I never went on the ice ever again after that."
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branchandroot
Melting the Ice, part one
Date: 2009-06-17 08:10 am (UTC)------
Melting the Ice
------
Clark watched glumly as the figures on the small lake laughed and twirled around, effortlessly gliding across the frozen water. Lana was out there, and Whitney, and Chloe, and Pete, and… everybody but him, it seemed.
"Clark, shouldn't you be on the ice?" A husky warm voice, too low-pitched to come out of that slender frame but fitting the speaker just right, like a driving glove over a thin strong hand.
Everybody but him and Lex. Clark turned around happily to greet his friend. "Lex!" He'd thought Lex was still working. It was only the high schoolers who got the snow day off.
"Half my employees had to leave early to go pick up their kids, so I said what the halibut and gave everybody else the rest of the day too." Lex flashed his trademark grin. "That didn't leave me anything to do, so I came here."
Clark's brain finally caught up with his eyes and he registered the ice skates slung over Lex's shoulder. With a sigh, he realized he really would be the only one out on the shore again.
Frowning, Lex put down the ice skates on a nearby log. "Okay, your mood just went from a hundred to negative twenty in less time than my SSC Aero gets to sixty." He walked up to Clark and faced the lake, bumping shoulders with his friend.
Feeling unaccountably happy that his friend was skipping skating to stand in the chilly weather with him, Clark also turned to face the lake, making sure when he turned around that the shoulder contact stayed.
They watched the skaters for awhile, but Clark wasn't really so involved with them anymore. Instead, he listened with his eyes half-closed to the way Lex's breath sounded coming out in the cold air, and how Lex would then breathe in again through his nose. Tree branches crackled as the breezes knocked frozen limbs around, and it was warm where their shoulders and arms touched.
"When I was ten, my dad took me out to an ice-skating rink. First time in my life I'd ever seen that much frozen water in one place," Lex said. "People were gliding all over it, but they weren't laughing like your friends – they were serious. This was the world-class rink where Olympians came to practice. It was all very somber and intense. Very chilling." Lex huffed a little laugh. "So Dad tossed me out there to learn."
"Tossed you out there?" Clark was horrified. Every time Lex came up with one of his little 'past history' lectures, Clark was always torn being laughing and wanting to kidnap Lex home to his family and keep him there and share with him everything a childhood was *supposed* to be.
Lex laughed. "Not literally. Dad had hired the best ex-champions who were willing to teach rich brats, and I learned." He fell silent for a bit. "Never really liked it, though. Always too cold."
Clark edged in a bit closer, moving a bit behind Lex so that he could share more of his body warmth. He'd noticed before that Lex tended to get more cold than other people.
"When I was eight, I fell through the pond," Clark offered.
Lex stiffened in surprise next to him, and then quickly relaxed. Clark thought the relaxed part was forced. "My God, Clark… were you all right?"
"Oh, I was fine," Clark said with a little laugh. Even back then, cold hadn't really affected him. "It was harder, though, to explain to the teachers how I'd fallen through the five feet of ice the pond had built up that year. They finally decided a tree branch had weakened it the night before and I just happened to fall on that one weakened spot." Clark sighed. "I never went on the ice ever again after that."