solarcore: (164)

[personal profile] solarcore 2018-02-08 08:47 am (UTC)(link)
The chair is urged aside, and it skitters off like ten feet with barely a nudge, somehow non-violent despite the casual display of great strength. Pain makes divots at Clark's brow, but not for some reminder about his own strange mortality, but for how wrong it feels for Bruce to say something like that. Bruce, who saved him, who did so in a way that didn't feel like he was summoning some Superman-shaped angel to save the day, but who put Clark back in those shoes. Who saved Martha, and brought Lois to him, and gave him back his home.

It's a lot to think and feel and impossible to articulate in this moment without sounding insane, and all the more frustrating because he didn't think this was brand new information, or minimised so much under the spectre of I killed you.

So Clark doesn't, you know, try. He steps forward though, suddenly right there, suddenly with his hands up and gentle against the sides of Bruce's face. It feels like a dangerously fine line, between being too much and overcorrecting into too little, but at a certain point, he generally follows his instinct.

"You brought me back," he says, steady, earnest, like he could make all this real simple, real fast, if Bruce would let him. "And this is where I wanna be. Don't send me away."
solarcore: <user name="oslo" site="insanejournal.com"> (184)

[personal profile] solarcore 2018-02-08 11:26 am (UTC)(link)
Clark shakes his head, a mild inscrutable gesture, some of the urgency dissipating with it. Relaxing at the edges, mostly to show Bruce how that much is done. The edges of his thumbs trace cheekbone slopes, more tender and concerned than attempting to evoke anything other than calm.

"Me neither," he says. Admits, really. "We'll figure it out."

It still hurts a little, no matter if Bruce was just lashing out, if he meant none of it. The idea that Clark doesn't know what he's doing, that his judgment is impaired, that he has to stay out of Gotham. Bruises only, though, and it's enough to know that maybe they're not done here yet.

He takes a breath like he's gonna say more, but mostly just comes up with, "I'm sorry," again, and slips near to pull Bruce into an embrace proper, chin over shoulder.
solarcore: (#11916687)

[personal profile] solarcore 2018-02-10 11:35 am (UTC)(link)
Clark wants to hold on until Bruce does in return, at least properly, but he can recognise that the touch in return, this stillness, is a sharp difference to turned backs and twitched reactions. As Bruce speaks, he doesn't let go, a canine lean-in that's only heavy in a human kind of way, even if Bruce is probably both hyperaware enough and hyperfamiliar enough to sense the way any hold from Clark comes with practiced restraint.

"Okay," he says, finally, head still on shoulder until he finally lifts it, then. "But you have to ask for it."

As in, that has to be a thing that ever happens, says insistent tone. Not just a loophole of avoidance. He's only backed off enough for a semi-dignified speaking distance, arms looped around broad shoulders. "When you need it, you ask me."
solarcore: (#11893083)

[personal profile] solarcore 2018-02-13 10:49 am (UTC)(link)
It feels almost ill-gotten, this acquiescence on both their parts, but Clark will take it. The alternative feels wrong, even more wrong than letting someone fall. Like letting himself fall.

But Bruce against him feels like relief, and he settles into the hold, fingers curling in a fold of fabric, breath felt against Bruce's neck. Familiar baking heat that seems to emanate from the core of him, transferred easily in the crush of their bodies together. His temple brushes against Bruce's, before he tips as if to--

Well he doesn't, actually, kiss him, and not for a lack of desiring to do so. Maybe remembering his witless pawing the night before, and deciding to welcome it rather than initiate.

"Good," he says, in the interim, fingertips finding where shirt collar ends and skin at the back of Bruce's neck begins.
solarcore: (#11967035)

[personal profile] solarcore 2018-02-21 12:30 pm (UTC)(link)
There's a hell of a thing to say.

So Clark is a little glad for the fact that at this angle, expressions can't be made out. Just gesture, the solid circle that Bruce's arms make around him -- and the thought that that may never have happened again feels more like the real close call, here -- and the quiet, low texture of his voice.

But it's a hell of a thing to say and he frowns at nothing, minuscule touches of his fingers and the comfortable warmth between them not back up. That feels like a lot to unpack for right now, but so long as they're setting down some boundaries, no matter how they might sound--

"I know," he says. "I promise. Bruce..."

He wants to tell Bruce it's going to be okay, but he doesn't want to give him something to disagree with. So Clark selects the kind of something he can't, and gently kisses his mouth. It's a steady moment of contact, controlled, borderline chaste if not for the intimate tangle of arms, shared body warmth and breathing.

Apologetic, "My turn. You need to get some sleep."