Disclaimer: I don't own any of this.

A/N: I was almost an English teacher myself once, but now I just feel like I owe Shakespeare an apology.

Pentameter

Lex Luthor was smiling; it had been a good week for him. His Q2 results had come in higher than even his best expectations – which had so enraged Lionel that when he'd challenged Lex to chess after last night's board meeting, he'd routed him easily. His new Porsche 911 had finally arrived from Germany, and between performance and sheer good looks was turning out to be well worth the wait. And, as if to provide the icing on the cake, he'd thought he'd detected less frostiness from Jonathan Kent just now as they exchanged passing greetings in the barnyard. He couldn't be entirely sure, of course – Jonathan being so stubborn and gruff – but today his eyes had seemed to lack their normal steely glare. Though it could have been that Lex's high spirits just made him feel their daggers less.

In any case, he was in a great mood.

Clark Kent, however, was not smiling. It was Friday afternoon, the weekend promised to be one of the first really nice ones of the spring, and he knew there was a better-than-good chance that Lex's box seats to the Metropolis Meteors were the reason for his impromptu visit. Lex had mentioned the tickets to him just a few weeks ago, the evening they'd spent together at the Talon poring over the spring training preview section in the Planet … Clark now listened to Lex's car purring down the driveway and his feet crunching across the dirt yard with a sinking heart.

There was nothing he'd like better than to drive to Metropolis with Lex to catch a ballgame. He could just imagine it now: the warm sun on their faces, the vibrant green of the infield, the light breeze full of organ music and the smell of hot dogs and popcorn. It sounded just like heaven.

Chalk it up to just another normal, beautiful, human thing Clark couldn't have. Because Lex could dangle those tickets in front of his nose all he wanted; it wouldn't make a damn bit of difference. He'd be stuck here all weekend working on this stupid paper.

"So what do you think, Clark?" Lex's voice preceded him up the stairs to the loft; Clark could hear the grin in his tone. It made him even more depressed. "Is this perfect baseball weather or what?"

"I was afraid you were going to say that," Clark replied glumly, looking up to greet him with an expression that practically dripped with tragedy.

Lex couldn't help but think, with an inward smile, how young Clark looked when he was feeling sorry for himself. Normally the difference in their ages felt almost insignificant; there was something so mature about Clark, or else he breathed life into whatever was left of Lex's own youth. It felt good, though, to be occasionally reminded that he was the older, wiser one; he liked to think that he could lend Clark a little perspective.

He glanced over the schoolwork spread out on the old trunk in front of the sofa. "Big exam?" he ventured. "I'm sure you can risk a couple hours' study break. I'll quiz you on the drive, that'll count for something."

"English paper," Clark grumbled, "so unfortunately I'm pretty sure my whole weekend's shot. One day I'm going to be able to accept one of these invitations of yours, Lex – as long as you keep on offering them. But either your timing is chronically bad, or else I'm just cursed."

"My timing happens to be impeccable," Lex smiled, lowering himself to the sofa beside Clark. "You, on the other hand, probably procrastinated yourself into this mess – right?"

Clark huffed. "You don't have to rub it in."

Lex smirked and leaned forward, picked up Clark's English textbook. "What's the paper on?"

"Poetry," Clark pronounced in a tone that sounded more suited to a word like poison. "I have to do an analysis of some Shakespeare sonnet … three pages, due Monday. You might as well forget about me this weekend, Lex; I'm not going anywhere."

Lex, however, seemed impervious to Clark's fatalism. "Which sonnet?"

Clark glanced at him sidelong; but Lex looked legitimately interested. "Um …" He fanned his huge hands over the jumble of papers, selected one, read out, "… number 36."

"Let me confess that we two must be twain," Lex replied, closing his eyes as he recited.

Clark was incredulous. "You know it?"

"I know most of the Sonnets," he admitted. "That's an interesting one; you shouldn't have too much trouble analyzing it."

"But I hate poetry," Clark protested. "I've read it over a bunch of times already and I have no idea what it means." In a moment of frustration, he crumpled the assignment sheet into a ball and lobbed it across the loft.

Lex chuckled. "Tell you what," he said, "there's a double-header tomorrow afternoon. I'll help you with your paper and you'll be done in plenty of time for us to go. Deal?"

"You can't be serious."

"Why not?"

Clark lifted his eyebrows in disbelief. "You're going to waste your Friday night helping me with my homework."

"It's not a waste," Lex said, rising. "I love Shakespeare, but I haven't dissected it since college; it'll be even more interesting to talk about it with you." His smile was warm, free of any teasing. "And then you'll be free to come with me to the game – so it sounds like a win-win to me."

"All right," Clark responded, though his expression clearly revealed that he thought Lex was crazy. "I guess I'm a lot less likely to get a big fat F this way."

Lex's mouth curled in at the corner. "I have an Annotated Shakespeare in my library. Why don't you come over later and we'll knock this out of the park."

Clark finally cracked a smile. "Okay. After dinner?"

"Sure."

*

Clark super-sped through all his chores and hurried through the rest of his homework before heading inside to wash up for dinner. He really was dying to go to the game with Lex, and was bound and determined to do whatever was necessary to make it happen. And to be honest, the idea of Lex's help was making the thought this paper a lot less horrible. Having his friend there to talk to, laugh with, and bounce ideas off of might even make the whole thing enjoyable.

He just hoped he could keep too much of Lex from creeping into the paper. Lex was so brilliant and comfortable when it came to the words of great writers – and his English teacher would never buy it. He'd just have to be really careful.

He packed up his books and set out for the mansion, feeling significantly more optimistic than he had earlier that afternoon. He'd finish the paper tonight if they had to pull an all-nighter to do it. Nothing was going to keep them from that baseball game. Nothing.

*

Lex found himself pacing the library and wondered what was the matter with him. Clark had spent plenty of evenings with his schoolwork scattered across the table in this room. Sometimes they chatted while Clark worked; other times Lex set up across the table with his laptop and some homework of his own. Still others he shot pool or played the piano quietly, only occasionally glancing towards his friend where he sat crouched over his books.

He was always sure those glances were nothing more than occasional. Clark might be oblivious to how intelligent and focused he looked while he was studying, but if Lex weren't careful it could have been so easy to stare.

Lex knew what he was doing. Years in business with his father – hell, years as his father's son – had taught him to measure each word, each step, each expression with care. So there was no reason to be nervous. He knew he had the matter well in hand.

He'd help Clark with his paper. They'd talk, they'd joke, they'd probably stay up too late. They'd finish the paper and go see the Meteors play tomorrow. They'd cheer until they were hoarse, eat hot dogs until they were sick, and drive home again at a speed they'd both pray Jonathan Kent would never find out about. It would be a great time.

They were best friends, after all.

Lex tried not to think too much about the sonnets of Shakespeare, the tenderness and passion and misery they contained. He tried to forget that Clark's assigned poem was from the Fair Youth cycle, and the longing with which the Poet described the younger man's beauty. He tried to pretend it didn't cut a little close.

He stamped down on the impulse to go look in the mirror one more time, to change his shirt again or agonize over how many buttons to leave undone.

There were plenty of critics who insisted that the Poet's love was unconsummated. And there was no textual evidence to suggest that they were wrong.

*

"So where do we start?"

"At the beginning. Why don't you read it out loud?"

Clark set his jaw and made a small sound of frustration. "It seems to make less sense every time I read it – not more."

"That's because you're being stubborn." Lex relieved Clark of his copy of The Annotated Complete Works of Shakespeare. "Just listen."

He only held the volume for something to do with his hands. He barely glanced at it as he recited.

"Let me confess that we two must be twain,
Although our undivided loves are one:
So shall those blots that do with me remain,
Without thy help, by me be borne alone.
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a separable spite,
Which though it alter not love's sole effect,
Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight.
I may not evermore acknowledge thee,
Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame,
Nor thou with public kindness honour me,
Unless thou take that honour from thy name:
But do not so, I love thee in such sort,
As thou being mine, mine is thy good report."

As Clark listened, he couldn't help but think that Lex's voice must have been designed for the recitation of Shakespeare. But as beautiful as he made it sound, he still felt completely at a loss.

"Well?"

"Sorry," Clark grinned. "I got nothing."

"How can you be so prosaic?" Lex asked, his tone light and teasing. "Shakespeare is the greatest poet in the history of the English language, possibly in the history of the human race. Those words don't make you feel anything?"

"Just confused," Clark laughed. "I hate poetry – just say what you mean, and leave it at that."

Lex shook his head. "I can appreciate your pragmatism, but I don't think your English teacher will." He pulled up a chair beside Clark and placed the open book on the table. "Here, let's take it line by line. You read it this time."

"Let me confess that we two must be twain," Clark read, and looked at Lex questioningly.

"Twain?" he prompted.

"Well, here," Clark said, pointing to the footnotes, "it says that 'twain' can mean separate."

"So, we must be separate," Lex affirmed. "Go on."

"Although our undivided loves are one."

"That's easy."

"Okay, so – we can't be together, even though we want to?"

"A possible interpretation," Lex murmured, lifting one eyebrow.

Clark sighed. Poetry, impossible love … he couldn't help thinking of Lana. He wondered which sonnet she'd pulled in this assignment, and tapped his pencil impatiently; regardless of which it was, he doubted it was making her think of him.

"Come on, Clark." Lex interrupted his brooding. "It doesn't have to be so complicated; you just have to pay attention. Here, the next two lines are probably best taken together. Read them as one line – don't pause at the end of the first."

Clark shook his head and obliged him by reading, "'So shall those blots that do with me remain, without thy help, by me be borne alone.' Now that's a complete mystery."

"No it isn't," Lex argued. "Just take it apart: what are 'blots'?"

"Stains?"

"Okay, so what's the poet saying then?"

Clark's forehead creased. "That … he's … stained?"

Lex laughed. "You make it sound so painful."

"Cut it out," Clark chuckled, jostling Lex's elbow. "I'm no good at this; it makes me feel stupid."

"Poetry," Lex mused, gazing into the fire for the sake of looking somewhere other than Clark's eyes, "is at its heart just an expression of the human experience. Just look for the feeling behind the words, Clark. If the first thought in the poem is that these two must be separate – what do these lines add to that?"

Clark looked them over again, his lips moving slightly as he read. Finally, he said, "That it's the poet's fault somehow."

"Okay – but not just that, right? What is he saying to his lover?"

"That … he'll bear it on his own. That he knows he's to blame, and doesn't want to be told it's not his fault." As he spoke, Clark was surprised to hear himself sound so confident – but he realized he understood that feeling all too well. It was all his fault, wasn't it, all the hurt that Lana had had to endure? The meteor shower, everything … he'd caused it. He hadn't meant to, but it was because of him that the Langs were dead.

He'd had that thought a hundred times since his father had told him the truth about where he'd come from, but he'd pushed it away just as many. He was so surprised – and hurt – to have it rushing back now that he barely heard Lex's approving response.

"I've always read it as, 'At least let me have the blame, if I can't have you.'" Lex sighed faintly. "Funny, isn't it – even Shakespeare occasionally had to nurse a broken heart." He tried to make it sound like a joke, but he wasn't sure Clark was really listening. "Keep going."

"In our two loves there is but one respect, though in our lives a separable spite," Clark read, a little flatly.

"What do you see there?"

"Well, 'spite' is something cruel – so there's something unfair that keeps us apart, even though we both feel this way, this 'one respect.'"

Lex glanced at him. "See, you're finding your stride now."

Clark didn't answer, just read on. "'…a separable spite, which though it alter not love's sole effect, yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight.' It doesn't change the way we feel, but it keeps us from enjoying it."

"Yes," Lex said softly. He'd known Clark could do this; he'd just needed a little push to get him started. But it was harder than he'd expected, to hear these words in Clark's mouth. He knew he wasn't talking to him; it was just the Shakespeare. And anyway, from the distant expression in his face, it was clear Clark was thinking – as always – about Lana.

A separable spite, indeed. Lana certainly did steal sweet hours from Lex's love's delight.

"Lex?"

Was he daydreaming? Clark was looking at him with a strange expression on his face.

"Yeah?"

"This poem is depressing."

Chuckling, Lex shook his head. "Unfortunately, a lot of the best poetry is about unrequited love … which, you're right, is pretty depressing."

Clark shoved the book away. "But I guess it's something that everyone can understand."

"Yes," Lex said quietly. "… Do you want to talk about it?"

Lex's intense perception always managed to take Clark by surprise. He looked at his friend, who was watching him with an even, knowing expression. He wondered if Lana's name was actually written across his own face; he must be being incredibly obvious again. For a moment he considered Lex's offer, but then he sighed and pulled the book back again. "Not really."

Relief welled in Lex's chest. He wanted to be a good friend to Clark, he really did. But he wasn't sure he could stand yet another treatise on Lana's eyes, or how pretty she looked in pink … after all the variations on that theme he'd had to endure, he wondered how Clark could honestly claim to hate poetry. He glanced down at his own shirt and was infinitely thankful he far preferred purple anyway. "All right. Onward, then."

Clark cleared his throat, then read, "I may not evermore acknowledge thee, lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame."

"It just keeps getting better, doesn't it?" Lex replied with a wry smile.

"Yeah. So here he's thinking about walking away, right?"

"You tell me. Why would he?"

"So … so that whatever he's guilty of won't hurt his lover. That's the shame he's talking about." Again the words came easily, and Clark recognized another feeling he knew too well. It was never far from his mind, the fear of how his secret could be used to hurt the people he loved. Lana – his parents – Chloe, Pete, even Lex could be vulnerable if the knowledge of who he really was fell into the wrong hands.

He felt a stab of guilt. Maybe it was wrong of him to do this, to masquerade as human, to let people get too close to him. Maybe they'd be safer if he turned his back on them.

"Hmm," Lex said, leaning closer to look over the lines. "You make him sound like a criminal. I don't think I'd read it that way."

Clark managed a teasing grin. "Well then, Professor, set me straight."

Lex smiled in reply. "You just said yourself that the reason for their separation is unfair. But just because he accepts it must be so doesn't mean he's taking it well. He describes himself as 'bewailed' – I think he's taking it exactly the opposite. So maybe that shame is embarrassment. It's an ugly breakup, but he doesn't want to make a scene."

"So he'll just … pretend it never happened?"

"Sometimes it's easier," Lex said evenly, "to make believe the feelings aren't there."

Clark looked back at the poem again, then said, "I don't know. I still think he feels he's protecting his lover from something – that distancing himself is the safest thing to do."

"You've found your thesis? Let's hear your evidence."

"The next lines – 'Nor thou with public kindness honour me, unless thou take that honour from thy name.' That sounds like … like even associating with him is enough to cause harm."

"What kind of harm?"

"Losing face, maybe," Clark answered, tracing the line with one finger. "He mentions 'public kindness.' He thinks he's not good enough somehow, that if anyone saw them together it would lower her in their eyes."

Lex thought about the way the people of Smallville still looked at him. Even after all these months and all his gestures, they still regarded him with distrust. It didn't seem to matter, the good things he'd tried to do, the other side of himself that he'd tried so hard to show them; they seemed to just expect him to turn, at any moment – and perhaps with a puff of smoke and a whiff of sulfur – into Lionel. And sometimes he even thought he saw that suspicion touching Clark as well: what was the Kent boy doing with a Luthor? Didn't he know they were all the same?

He forced the feeling down, with the others he'd never speak aloud. "I'm impressed, Clark; you've found a level of meaning here I'd never considered before."

Clark smiled and colored a little at Lex's praise. "I feel like I'm just making things up."

"Sometimes that's all literary analysis is," Lex insisted. "Just two lines left now."

"But do not so, I love thee in such sort, as thou being mine, mine is thy good report." Clark frowned. "And now I'm lost again. 'Do not so' … what?"

"That's the turn," Lex said. "Most sonnets have them; the mood shifts. Sometimes the poet even takes back all he's just said. So what does he have to take back?"

Clark considered. "He admits he loves her. He never really says it before this line. So maybe all of that other stuff – the shame, the guilt, the resignation – doesn't really matter."

"If the love is only great enough?" Lex felt suddenly impatient, perhaps because of the hope that had seemed to come back into Clark's face with those last two lines. And it was petty – he knew it – but he reacted with revulsion at Clark's mistaken pronoun. Perhaps his teacher had thought it too unseemly to include the Fair Youth in her lessons … he bit back the urge to undermine her. "The story doesn't always end that way, Clark," he said instead, rising from his chair to distance himself from Clark's thoughts of Lana. "The two leads don't always end up together."

"But he says 'thou being mine.'"

"Two people can belong to one another, and yet not be together." Lex strode to the bar and hastily opened a bottle of water. There, again, was that irritating and inexplicable nervousness. Why was his mouth so dry? "How does the poem begin?"

Clark raised his eyes to the top of the page again. "Let me confess that we two must be twain."

"So this is definitely a separation sonnet. Just because they love each other doesn't change that."

Clark frowned slightly and his lips grew thin. Finally he announced, "I don't like it."

Lex chuckled and felt some of his tension drift away. Returning to his seat with a second bottle of water for Clark, he replied, "You don't have to like it. Poetry isn't a riddle to be solved; you don't need to find an answer to the poet's conundrum. You just have to write a couple of pages about it. So what do the last two lines mean?"

"Well, I think it means that he loves her good reputation – her 'good report' – as much as he loves her. So 'do not so' refers back to 'unless thou take that honor from thy name' – right?"

"Okay. So what conclusion does he reach? Look back to the first line again."

Clark's eyes flitted across the page, and a moment passed where he was silent and thoughtful. "That they should go their separate ways. He won't come to her anymore, and she shouldn't do him any more kindness. He loves her too much to see her dishonored by him."

Lex leveled him a look. "You did it, Clark."

"I did what?"

"You analyzed a sonnet."

Clark glanced from Lex's face to the book, then back again, and flashed his friend his thousand-watt smile. "I guess I did! With a little bit of help, of course."

"I didn't even do anything. Sometimes it's all in the questions you ask."

"Still," Clark insisted, clinking his water against Lex's in a celebratory gesture, "if you hadn't been here to ask those questions, I'd still be sitting in the loft, staring at the first two lines and swearing under my breath."

"Well, anything to prevent you from casting aspersions at Shakespeare," Lex demurred, spreading his palms wide. "Should I fire up the laptop for you? You should start writing while your thoughts are still fresh."

"In a minute," Clark said, rising from his chair. "How about a game of pool first?"

"I can't let you procrastinate, Clark," Lex chided, his eyes flashing with affectionate humor. "It would be incredibly irresponsible of me – and besides, maybe I object to being a pawn in your avoidance of your homework."

"I'm not making you a pawn! I just need a break before I dive back into intense literary analysis. After all, it's hardly my idea of a fun way to spend a Friday night."

"Remember why we're doing this," Lex pointed out. "Lit papers tonight mean baseball tomorrow."

"Just one game," Clark coaxed, cocking his head to one side. His eyes grew soft and he pouted slightly. He probably had no idea he was doing it; it was just his adorable, irresistible second nature.

Lex already knew he was going to give in. He'd just needed to protest a little – for the sake of appearances. "All right," he said, as grudgingly as he could muster.

As Lex moved towards the cabinet to pull out the cues, Clark added, "And maybe something to eat?"

Lex threw him a skeptical look over his shoulder. "You said you had dinner at home."

"I did. But dissecting poetry makes a guy hungry."

*

Lex beat Clark at pool three times in a row, but Clark just grinned and made himself another sandwich. He didn't think there was any chance he'd ever win against Lex at any game of skill; but at least he could outdo him at eating.

"That," Lex said, his voice ringing with something Clark decided to consider awe, "is disgusting."

"What? I'm a growing boy," Clark said around a full mouth. The turkey and bread may have come from the market, but these were definitely Kent Farm tomatoes. He recognized them, the rich dark scent of familiar soil still clinging to their flesh. It meant something to him that Lex bought his produce from his family. Lex could have anything he wanted, fly in any food he craved from any remote part of the world; but instead he chose what Jonathan and Martha and Clark brought out of the earth with their own hands.

It was no secret to Clark that Lex looked on his family with an almost worshipful air of longing. Maybe this was his way of buying in. He wished he could tell Lex that it wasn't necessary – he didn't have to make any grand displays, that they welcomed him exactly as he was. The only problem was that he felt pretty sure his father felt exactly the opposite. But Clark would be friends with Lex no matter what Jonathan said, and even without new pickup trucks or baseball tickets. It was because of things like this – their easy conversation, the way they played so comfortably off each other.

But help with Shakespeare was definitely a bonus. And he'd seen the sigh of relief Martha tried to conceal when the Luthor produce check arrived every week. So Clark took another bite of his sandwich and didn't say anything. Lex seemed to enjoy his gestures more, anyway, when less was made of them.

"I suppose you could be a poster-child for the benefits of organic," Lex conceded. "But I still say you eat too much."

"You don't eat enough," he countered. "You're too thin."

"I beg your pardon!" Lex protested with extra dramatic flair. "I happen to have an excellent physique."

Clark's eyes danced devilishly. "Really? Who told you that?"

Lex thrilled ever so slightly at Clark's roguish expression. "Nobody who matters, unfortunately," he confessed with uncharacteristic humility. "Rack them again?"

"No," Clark sighed. "I'd better get started on my paper now, or else I'll be here all night."

"I wouldn't mind the company," Lex replied, casting a demonstrative look around the cavernous room. "It tends to get lonely here late at night. High ceilings may look impressive, but they keep the place from ever getting really warm."

"No wonder you've always got a fire going." Clark put his cue down. Lex was expecting him to turn back towards his books, but instead he lingered at the pool table's rail, running his fingers aimlessly over the felt. He wondered what he was thinking; but he didn't keep him guessing long. "Lex?"

"Yes?"

"You said something before, about even Shakespeare having a broken heart. But if he's the greatest poet ever in human history, and even he couldn't have the person he wanted …" Clark had been studying the patterns he was tracing on the pool table, but he suddenly lifted his eyes to Lex's. They seemed bottomless, and Lex felt himself in great danger of falling into them, never to be found again. " …what chance does that leave any of the rest of us?"

Lex hovered on the edge of that question, considering the peril that lay on either side. Clark looked so vulnerable; it made his pulse race, and for the hundredth time Lex asked himself, why not? Why not just tell him?

When he opened his mouth to reply, though, his words took on their usual cowardly shape – the familiar form of friendship. "You'll find someone, Clark," he assured him, letting his voice form the embrace he knew his arms never would. "It just may not be the Dark Lady of Smallville."

"Who?"

"Lana," Lex supplied softly. "Shakespeare wrote some of his sonnets to a Dark Lady – his mistress who ultimately betrayed him."

"Well," Clark mused, thinking back over the lines of his sonnet, "then I guess they didn't go their separate ways after all?"

"Ultimately they did. But they kept on loving each other, and breaking each other's hearts, for pages and pages first."

*

Clark tapped away on Lex's laptop, the glare of its screen throwing an almost otherworldly illumination over his features. Lex wondered if there were any light that would not flatter Clark: whether by sunlight or firelight or this pale artificial glow, he was beautiful in a way that mere words could not circumscribe.

He seemed to be making excellent progress on his paper; that fit of melancholy had been somewhat unexpected, but he'd recovered quickly and, after reading through the sonnet once again, had thrown himself into his writing. He typed quickly and messily, with much pressing of the Backspace key, but he was clearly getting somewhere. He hadn't spoken now for almost an hour.

Not that Lex minded if Clark withdrew into his work. If Clark was absorbed by his paper, it could only mean that he'd finish it sooner – and that they'd make those games tomorrow after all. That was, of course, the point of this entire exercise.

And while Clark concentrated on his work, Lex's own concentration on Clark could go unobserved.

Lex had declined to hover at Clark's shoulder while he wrote, putting up a staunch resistance when Clark had wheedled for help with his introduction. Instead he'd admonished him to use his own words, and retreated to the sofa in front of the fire with his volume of Shakespeare. At first he'd amused himself in leafing through its pages, in skimming over his best-beloved lines. But as his eyes kept drifting back over Clark's intent, studious form, Macbeth's wavering purpose (I have thee not, and yet I see thee still) and Hamlet's crippling indecision (Thus conscience does make cowards of us all) began to sound a little close for Lex's comfort.

In the end he gave up searching the Bard's words for an answer and simply let himself enjoy the scene: Clark was here with him. There was nothing and no one to try and come between them, no need to even break the comfortable and companionable silence. It filled him with a deep, peaceful satisfaction – a sense of rightness and completion.

Les found Clark's thoughtful expression as he worked bewitching, though, and wished he could interrupt his concentration to ask what he was thinking. He would let his book fall into his lap and watch with ill-concealed anticipation as Clark clicked the laptop shut … and Clark would amble across the shadowy space between them, his profound eyes glittering as he drew close enough to show Lex exactly what was on his mind …

"Lex? Are you awake?"

Clark was standing over him, a somewhat concerned cast to his features. He held the laptop under one arm.

"Sorry," Lex said, shaking his head to clear it. "I just got absorbed. What did you say?"

"I asked what you were reading."

Lex looked down in curiosity – he had barely been paying attention. But even in his absent-minded leafing, he found he had betrayed himself. He allowed only a very small wry smile as he answered, "The Sonnets. I suppose I was doing some analysis of my own."

"Which one?" Clark asked, skirting the sofa to sit beside him.

"Don't tell me you're suddenly interested in poetry," Lex chided.

"It's growing on me," Clark replied with a smile. "Go on, read it."

Lex glanced at the page again and felt a stab of unease. "You haven't had enough dramatic recitation for one night?"

Clark would not be deterred. "If it has meaning to you, I want to hear it."

If he'd twisted Lex's arm, he could not have been any more painfully persuasive. Lex sighed faintly through his nose, then began to read Sonnet 29 aloud.

"When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee,—and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings."

Clark listened with a deliciously rapt expression; Lex found it only twisted the knife more. Would Clark drink in so deeply if the words he spoke were his own? If he could do something other than shroud himself in iambic pentameter?

"That's interesting," Clark said finally. "It's hard to imagine you of all people feeling out of favor with fortune."

"You mistake," Lex answered, closing the book without marking the spot, "wealth for happiness."

"But there's happiness at the end of that sonnet," Clark argued. "'I scorn to change my state with kings' – that's pretty high praise."

"True. But clearly the poet finds his … friend … deserving of it."

"I hope you think I'm as good a friend, Lex," Clark said unexpectedly. As Lex turned towards him in surprise, Clark felt a sudden urge to reach out and cover Lex's hand with his own. Not knowing where it came from, or what to do with it, he pushed it aside in panic.

"Clark – I think more highly of you than you may ever know." His smile came sadly, but it was for Clark, and so it came nonetheless. "That sonnet fits you perfectly … my life is far from perfect, but your friendship lifts me up, even when things seem at their worst."

Clark felt his cheeks grow hot and dropped his gaze into his lap. He wasn't sure where this sudden surge of emotion was coming from … he just knew that Lex's good opinion was well worth having.

He didn't know what to say, though, and so was intensely relieved when Lex deftly changed the subject. "How's your paper coming?"

"I think I'm finished," he exclaimed with pride, suddenly remembering the laptop he still clutched in one hand. He held it out. "I was hoping you'd look it over for me, though."

"You trust me as your editor?" Lex teased.

Clark blinked self-consciously, but didn't draw back his hand. "You got me this far."

Lex read quickly; Clark barely had any time to grow anxious. The paper was well-written, though Lex still wasn't sure he bought Clark's strange theory about the poet's motivation. Withdrawing from someone you loved in order to protect them? – where would he get such a strange idea? But even though it jarred with Lex's own reading of the text, he could find no fault with Clark's logic. "It's good," he said finally, and handed the computer back.

Clark was surprised and a little deflated. He wasn't expecting voluminous praise, but that hardly counted as a response at all. "That's it?" he asked, a little petulantly. "'It's good'?"

"What should I say?"

"There's nothing you would change? You have no suggestions?"

"It's your paper, Clark," Lex answered with a strange note of resignation. "I won't distract from your words by adding any of my own."

"You don't like it." Clark didn't even try to keep it from sounding accusatory.

"My opinion doesn't matter," Lex replied, rising from his seat. The atmosphere was growing suddenly tense, and he reacted to the change by reflex, retreating behind a cool veneer. "Only your teacher's does, and I'm pretty sure you'll get high marks. Your reasoning is sound and you bring new ideas to the text."

"What's the matter?" Clark set the laptop on the coffee table and stood too. "What did I do wrong, Lex?"

Lex tried not to incline his head too far, though it was hard to meet Clark's gaze otherwise. When his mood was lighter, he didn't mind Clark's towering over him; in fact he often longed to fall into his shadow. But now it lent an edge of confrontation and it made him somehow indignant. "Nothing, Clark."

"Don't do that," Clark pleaded. "Your opinion does matter … it matters to me. Tell me."

His face was so honest and his voice so pure; Lex could deny him nothing, even his own safety. "It's not your fault. It's just … you've got all your pronouns wrong."

"What are you talking about?"

Lex angled away, carefully casting his features into shadow; it made it easier to dissemble. "You keep referring to the poet as 'he,' but his beloved as 'she.'"

"So?"

"So," Lex said with clear displeasure, "I suppose your teacher didn't tell you about the Fair Youth."

"No. What's that?"

"The poet's lover." Lex crossed his arms and wished briefly for a scotch; but he was beyond the point of no return now. "Most of the Sonnets weren't written to a woman, Clark."

Clark's jaw dropped. "Are you saying that Shakespeare was …"

"No one knows for sure. But he doesn't begin to refer to a Mistress until much later in the sequence. And your sonnet," Lex turned back and looked at him significantly, "is definitely addressed to the Fair Youth."

Again Clark felt strangely flustered. He didn't know what to say, so all he said was, "Oh."

Lex was watching him carefully. "Does that change anything for you?"

Clark reached for Lex's discarded book. He flipped it open to his sonnet and skimmed the lines for a moment in silence. Finally, he answered. "No, I don't suppose it does. Feelings are feelings, no matter who you feel them for."

Then he lifted his eyes to Lex's again, and suddenly everything became clear.

His fingers trembled slightly as he turned back a few pages to the sonnet Lex had just read aloud. "I just realized," he murmured.

"What?" Lex asked. While Clark's color had become hectic again, all the blood seemed to have rushed out of Lex's face; he appeared even paler than usual.

"Your sonnet must be too," Clark said, his green eyes surprisingly free of any question.

"To the Fair Youth?"

"Yes."

"… Yes, I suppose it is," Lex answered, unsure of what he was really confessing.

Clark closed the book again, placed it with reverence on top of the now-sleeping laptop, and turned back in one fluid motion. There was something unexpected in the air around him, a hint that things were about to change dramatically. "Lex," he ventured, his fingers seeking and finding Lex's wrist, "have I really missed it all this time?"

Lex could hardly comprehend what was happening and panic, hot and sudden, thrummed through his veins. "What are you talking about, Clark?"

But Clark would not be deterred. "That our undivided loves," he smiled playfully, "are one."

The turn of his voice made Lex's heart swell – it was the sound of all their jokes, their good-natured bantering, the things he most dearly feared to lose. But they were not lost; in fact they had only gained a new richness. Lex luxuriated in the tenor of it, and let all his doubts be eclipsed by the force of the wants it inspired.

"Don't quote Shakespeare on me," he cautioned teasingly. "I'll lose all will to resist you."

"What if," Clark asked, sliding closer still, "I don't want you to resist?"

Now Lex had to tip his head back to hold Clark's eyes; but he did so with great pleasure. "Then just be yourself," he replied, taking control of Clark's tentative touch and guiding his strong arm around his own waist. "You're already irresistible."

"Lex," Clark whispered urgently as Lex moved into his arms. "I …"

"Shh," Lex interrupted, kissing him. "I've had enough analysis for one night – haven't you?"

*

Some time later, Clark asked, "What was that you called it, when the mood shifts?"

"The turn." Lex marked his place with his forefinger and half-turned towards him. For all the times he'd dreamed of Clark's embrace, his imagination had never really captured how comfortable it would be. It was as if Clark's chest had been fashioned for no purpose other than to support Lex's spine, the contours of his cheek and collarbone designed specifically to accommodate the reclining of Lex's head. They had been arranged like this for what seemed like hours, Lex reading aloud from The Sonnets and Clark occasionally reaching around to turn the page for him, or interrupting to ask for a translation. Lex had had to concentrate very hard on his recitation; only meter and rhyme stood between him and his utter surrender to the flickering of the fire and the ghosting of Clark's warm breath behind his ear.

"That's it," Clark murmured approvingly. "I like it."

"You like the turn?" Lex repeated, his tone amused. As if Literature should care whether Clark Kent liked its concepts? … Yes, yes it should.

"It just feels right to call it that," he replied meditatively. "I like the imagery of it – the turn." His arms tightened and he shifted his cheek against Lex's scalp; the faint stubble there scratched lightly and sent a current through Lex's senses. "When did you turn, Lex?"

"Not every sonnet has a turn, Clark."

"Are you saying you never did?" Clark asked with an intimate smile. "Because I think you're lying."

"I'm not," Lex insisted, letting the book fall to the floor as he twisted in Clark's arms. "I never had to – I've always wanted you."

*

The next day was as bright and beautiful a Saturday as you could hope for. Jonathan Kent had looked at Clark with disapproval when he'd avoided answering his very pointed questions about exactly what time Clark had gotten in the night before.

"I was at Lex's working on my lit paper," he explained. Martha, always the weak reed, had smiled kindly over the pages Clark had printed, stapled, and placed with great care next to his place at the breakfast table, all ready for school on Monday morning. "And I've already finished the rest of my homework – and my chores – so don't tell me no, Dad. Lex has box seats to the Meteors and he'll be here any minute to pick me up."

Jonathan never did actually say either yes or no. But suddenly Lex's tires could suddenly be heard crunching down the gravel track, and Clark darted out the front door before he had much of a chance to say anything. Clark didn't use his speed – he was sure of that much – but he and Lex were already pulling away by the time Jonathan and Martha reached the porch railing. It was as if the two boys were making some kind of getaway.

"It's a double-header," Clark called through the rolled-down passenger window. "I'll be home late!"