Disclaimer : Nope, not mine.

Notes : Thanks to Celli and Janet, betas extraordinaires. You guys rock beyong measure!

Feedback : goes so well with my morning coffee :)

If you can look into the seeds of time, And say which grain will grow and which will not. Macbeth. Act i. Sc3.

Each year, Clark Kent drives back to Smallville. Each year is a struggle. A struggle for survival, for power and precedence. A struggle no one can know about or understand, about petty things that mean the world: driving and not flying, turning his hearing off and letting the world be for a day, wearing regular clothes and leaving the spandex home. He's always liked driving, likes the feeling of it, both freeing and exhilarating at the same time, likes how miles feel like years, each mile a symbol of years passed. And driving to Smallville is also this: a way to erase time and be 18 all over again, back when his world changed, when destiny prevailed. Back when promises were made.

Each year as he parks the car, he marvels at how little things change, and this in itself is a victory. A victory over the red and blue spandex that became a second skin, a reminder of who he was and who he still is. Each year is harder though, Superman a burden he's hardly able to lift anymore, and each year he wonders why he didn't do anything to stop all this, to put an end to the lie his life was slowly becoming when he still could. But it's not that easy, and he can still remember the one time he came close, the one time he almost wore the jean and flannel hoping someone would notice. Notice how he still looked the same after all these years. Notice the uncanny resemblance he bore to a certain superhero.

He never did.

Each year finds him drinking bad coffee at the Talon, watching people. Most of them are strangers now, but he can still find faces that remind him of himself, that anchor him to himself. Lana, who comes to serve him coffee, even though she's far above waitressing now. Mrs Fordman, who always manages to show up and say hello. Each year he tries to pretend it's enough, that he doesn't need any other faces, but that's a lie and he knows it, as grief gets harder and harder to bear. Each year he hates himself more for using that grief as an anchor, for using the strength of it a reminder that he can still feel. That he still is.

Each year brings him to the same spot, and curiously, each time is like that first time. Same weather, same light, same everything and despite appearances he feels that he's the one who's changing the most, as the cloak becomes a little heavier to shed, as the pull weakens, a painful wake-up call that reminds him how easy it would be to lose himself completely. Each year on that bridge he remembers promises exchanged and shared dreams, but his heart always feels a little colder, his soul a little emptier and he wonders how much longer he'll be able to live up to his promise. How much of himself will be there next time to try.

Each year he manages to persuade himself that he chose the right path as he counts lives saved and disasters avoided. Each year he tells himself that being a hero was his foremost destiny, a destiny he couldn't have fulfilled had he chosen any other way, a destiny that would have been hindered by what was left behind. Each year he tries to convince himself that all these lives saved are worth more than his. Than theirs. Than what they had and gave away.

Each year finds him there, forcing himself to remember why and how and, God, why he had agreed on this being the best solution, the best way for both of them to live up to their own expectations and dreams, the best way for them to be together again. He wonders if he knew he was already lying to himself back then, as years have shed a harsh light on his memories and now, more than reasons, he remembers the relief he felt at being offered a way out, the rationale behind it nothing but a excuse to be convinced. He remembers how afraid he was to give up too much of himself to someone who was just so much more than he, to be called on for all the lies he told. He wonders if he knew back then that lies could kill even the strongest dreams.

Each year the irony of it all hits him full force, and even though he's not the only one to blame, he can't help taking responsibility for what happened. For what they both became. He had to know even then that all this was but a ploy, a fucked-up way of asking for commitment, had to know the consequences of his refusal. Had to know he'd never get the friendship back when it had been so much more, that estrangement would settle in, that neither of them were made for gray areas. He used to feel the guilt deep in his bones, but even that is going away now. Each year finds him struggling to find the very feeling that turned him into a solitary figure on a bridge.

Each year sees him there, waiting and waiting and waiting until time has no more meaning, until darkness becomes the only sign that this year is again not the one. Each year reasons become harder to find, scenarios harder to believe, harder to hang onto when put against the weight of his promise and the strength of his fight. Each year finds him crying, useless tears that used to flow and fall into the river, bitter symbols of disappointed expectations, but he has fewer and fewer tears to share now, as expectations become no more than an meaningless ritual he can't forget but doesn't understand anymore.

This year he sheds but one tear, a solitary drop too light for gravity to force it in the river where it belongs, and he thinks it appropriate that one tear symbolizes the death of thousands of dreams. The ritual has to begin, and he tries and concentrate on the river flow, far from everything, far from time, far from himself... but this year is different. Something is tugging at the border of his senses, something that prevents him from focusing: a sound, a new sound, a sound that's never been there before.

Step

Step

Step

He knows just then that someone is standing behind him; someone is staring at his back, but he can't make himself move, can't face whoever is there, can't bring himself to be disappointed if someone else is there, if someone was just passing by, if someone was not his someone.

"Would have been here earlier, but the car broke down."

The voice, behind him. To the... right? And he starts to shake, because the location of the voice is outside his head, because the voice doesn't belong to any scenario, because the voice is here and he wants to move but he can't, the need so bad but his whole body feels like stone, like marble, cold, so cold.

"Clark..."

He feels the voice moving, feels the heat of it penetrate through his ear and going straight to his heart, feels his heart move like it hasn't done in years, fighting against the weight it's been slowly buried under, feels the warmth travel everywhere. Feels like laughing and realizes he already is, the sound so foreign to his ears that he doesn't recognize it at first, hears another laugh right behind him and he knows now that he can move, knows what he will find when he turns around because that laugh says so much, because that laugh itself is a message, and he moves.

"Lex..."

All is forgotten in a second, years of estrangement, of coldness and heroism, years of power struggles, politics and success, because in that second there's no more Superman, no more Lexcorp, but only Clark and Lex, Lex and Clark, a promise fulfilled and dreams come true. There are no words to describe how he feels, most of them forgotten anyway but he doesn't care. He knows it will be hard, knows things won't come easily but right now, on that bridge, the bridge where it all began, he couldn't care less about the difficulties ahead, couldn't care less about anything. For the very first time, he is exactly who he wants to be. For the very first time he feels he has something to look forward to, and he laughs again as he realizes Lex had known all this from the start, laughs because he knows then what the next step has to be in order for them to start anew, for them to put all these failed years in the past where they belong.

"Lex, do you still believe a man can fly?"

And for the first time they go soaring together through the clouds with nothing but air beneath them, looking not at a dead end, but at a new beginning.