Title: Farewell to Friends
Rating: PG-13
Summary: We should all have the chance to leave on our own terms
Disclaimer: Not mine, but I sure do like to borrow them an awful lot.
A/N: addictedgirl is a pimping good beta...you rock like Sheila E on drums in '87...lol. Just a little piece that was kicking around my mind.
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"Thank you for coming," she said. It sounded like the sort of thing you heard at wakes or at those receptions after a funeral. What it really meant was “thank you for being enough of a friend to face your mortality”; to recognize the inevitable toll of death's bell.
He shrugged at her words. What was there to say? “You’re welcome” hardly seemed appropriate, so he said the first thing that came to mind.
"You wanted me to be here."
And even though he never said it, she knew him well enough to tack on "so I came right away."
In the mildly uncomfortable silence that pulled between them, his name stumbled off her lips.
"He stopped by today....he heard it was a good day. I think he knew what might happen here...passing his place and trying to be a hero even when he doesn't quite realize it" she revealed with no small amount of irony.
His jaw tightened reflexively at the implication. If Clark was the hero for showing up uninvited then what was he at her request?
"I didn't mean it that way Lex."
Her green eyes pierced him with their lucid strength. She pinned him with a look that escaped words. They were friends these two people. Companions in a world of deception and insanity for more years than they could count. They knew each other, mirrored one another on so many different levels.
Kindred, she had once called them. Calling out to one another while the rest of the world was repelled.
His shoulders relaxed finally and he moved to perch on the edge of her bed.
Stubby un-manicured fingers touched the delicate soft fabric of his cashmere sport coat. "Stay a while?" she joked.
He stood to shrug off his coat and ease out of his dully shining leather shoes.
When he eased back onto the mattress, he surprised them both by reclining before turning to face her.
"I'll stay until they kick me out." he returned seriously.
A corner of her once full and mobile mouth kicked up. A pale resurrection of the smiles she once gave without thought.
"So what's new Mr. President? Pushed any shiny red buttons lately?"
The bed vibrated with their laughter.
"Several times today, in fact." he admitted. "It’s called an intercom button."
More laughter fell in thick blankets around them. Cocooning them in a world of carefree friendship for a perfect moment out of time before silence took its place.
"You’ll never really do it you know?" she asked as her eyes bore into the off white ceiling above.
"I know," he replied, pewter orbs staring sightlessly into the ceiling as well. "But he'll never believe that."
Her eyebrows rose delicately in agreement.
"What difference does that make?" but clearly this was rhetorical.
"Seventy-four, sixty-eight, fifty-seven, fifty-three, twenty-four and two....days" she ejaculated and never once did he bat an eyelash.
His cultured baritone came back to her through open ears and closed eyes, "Clark, Martha and Jonathan, Lana, Pete, Lois and me. You’ve been looking at the logbook again I see. Riveting read?"
A noncommittal sound that could have been anything came from her side of the bed.
"Is that why you asked for me?"
Her "no" was quick and unwavering.
"You’re my friend. You don't see the shell, but you know I’m not that woman anymore...at least not most days." she carelessly brushed aside the long stringy length of blonde hair that fell insistently into her face. It was a sign of how much had changed. Her skin had grown sallow underneath the fluorescent lights. The veneer of youth seeping out of her as the stench of insanity soaked deeply into the crevices of her mind. "Tomorrow I probably won't be your friend, but I know you'll be mine."
He looked at her and she read the "always" in his eyes.
"So why today?" he asked
"Because I’m Chloe and you're Lex and that's how it should be."
"Doesn’t that make it harder?"
"Of course"
"............I’d do it for you...on another day if you wanted...on a day when YOU weren't here."
"I know. But I wouldn't make you do something like that alone. And I'd rather do it like this on my terms not this stupid disease's."
His hand journeyed towards her. Closing the distance and joining them together. He wouldn't let her do something like that alone either. That’s why he was here.
Their clasped hands were a testament to friendship.
"How long?" he whispered, like a sacrament to the divine
"Not long" she replied.
*****************************
"Thank you for coming" she had said. The kind of thing you said at wakes and those receptions after a funeral. He supposed that's sort of what this was. A wake for the living about to die. A farewell to herself amongst friends...in her case the only one she really wanted to have.
Before she left, her small rough hand touched his face. "If he asks, tell him. He’s not as human as he would like to think. I didn't want to die alone Lex; I just wanted to die in peace."
Silence fell between them once again, like another old friend in the room waiting for the farewell to come.
She was the first to go. Then silence left with the steady wail of her heart monitor. As he promised Lex Luthor did not leave his wife's side until they made him.
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