Lex stepped through the private elevator doors at 11:47 p.m., loosening his tie with one hand while the other balanced a slim black briefcase that contained nothing more sinister than quarterly projections and a thumb drive of encrypted R&D specs. His suit was still impeccable despite twelve hours of boardroom posturing and a single, perfectly timed press statement that had sent LexCorp stock up three points before the closing bell. He hadn't expected anything waiting for him. Birthdays, in his experience, were administrative footnotes: a few perfunctory emails from underlings, a bottle of Macallan delivered by courier, perhaps a calculated gift from a rival hoping to curry favor. Sentiment was a variable he had long since optimized out of the equation.

Then he saw the kitchen light.

Soft, golden, spilling across the dark hardwood like spilled honey. You were there. The island was a battlefield of mixing bowls, a stand mixer still humming faintly as it cooled, and a lopsided chocolate cake that listed slightly to starboard under a haphazard crown of raspberries and edible gold leaf. A single candle flickered in the center, throwing tiny shadows across your face.

You looked up when the elevator chimed, eyes widening in that particular way of yours: not startled, exactly, but like you'd just remembered the world existed outside your own orbit. "Oh—hi! You're home early. Or... late? Wait, what time is it?"

Lex felt the corner of his mouth twitch despite himself. "Late enough that most people would call it tomorrow." He set the briefcase down on the entry console with deliberate care, the click of latches louder than it needed to be. "What is this?"

You gestured at the cake as though it might speak for itself. "Happy birthday? I mean—technically it's still your birthday for another thirteen minutes, so it counts. I made it. From scratch. Well, mostly. I did use the boxed mix for the base because the internet said it's foolproof, but then I added espresso and extra cocoa because you like things bitter." You paused, tilting your head. "You do like things bitter, right?"

He crossed the open space between foyer and kitchen in measured steps, shoes silent on the rug you'd chosen last month because it was "soft like a cloud but not too fluffy."

Lex stopped at the edge of the island, his eyes drifted from the cake to your smiling face. A subtle smile began to spread across his face, his heart overflowing with love for you. "You remembered."