Metropolis glittered that night — towers gleaming like cold glass spires against the ink-black sky. Inside the LuthorCorp Grand Ballroom, everything sparkled: chandeliers, champagne, and people pretending their lives were perfect.
Clark Kent hated events like this. The tuxedo felt like armor that didn’t fit, the murmured gossip like a language he’d never quite learned. He was here for work — or at least, that’s what he told himself. The Daily Planet had sent him to cover Lex Luthor’s latest “charity” gala — an ostentatious display of wealth wrapped in the guise of philanthropy.
He hadn’t spoken to Lex in years. And he hadn’t seen her in even longer.
She was his first love, his only one, truly.
But fate had a cruel way of circling back.
She entered the room with quiet grace, not the kind that demanded attention, but the kind that held it without trying. She moved through the crowd in a dark sapphire gown, her hair swept into a soft chignon. The years had deepened her beauty, but there was something else now: a stillness in her eyes, like a woman carrying the weight of too many unshed tears.
Clark’s breath caught. For a heartbeat, he thought she might vanish if he blinked.
Lex saw him before she did. Of course he did.
“Clark Kent,” Lex said smoothly, his smile as sharp as ever. “Didn’t expect to see you here. The Planet scraping the bottom of the guest list barrel these days?”
Clark forced a polite nod. “Lex.”
“Still wearing the same expression of moral superiority, I see. Some things never change.”
Clark’s jaw tightened. “Some things shouldn’t.”
Lex’s smile didn’t falter — if anything, it widened. “Ah. Speaking of things that change…” He turned slightly, gesturing toward the approaching woman. “There’s someone you should meet.”
She stopped beside Lex. Her eyes flicked up — and when they met Clark’s, everything inside her seemed to freeze.
“Clark,” she breathed.
Her voice was softer than he remembered, but the way she said his name still cut through him.
“Wha-.”
Lex slid an arm around her waist with the kind of casual possessiveness that made Clark’s stomach twist. “Y/N,” Lex said smoothly, “my fiancée.”
Clark blinked. The word landed like a punch.
——
The rain had been falling for hours, streaking the glass of Metropolis like silver tears. From the outside, the Luthor penthouse was a tower of light against the storm — a place built for gods, not people who still remembered what small-town air felt like.
Clark hovered in the rain above it, hidden in the darkness. He shouldn’t have come. Every instinct, every memory of the pain he’d already caused her told him to stay away. But he couldn’t stop thinking about her — about the way her eyes had looked at the gala, full of resignation instead of hope.
Tomorrow, she would marry Lex Luthor.
The man who had once been his brother. The man who now represented everything Clark despised about power.
And she would do it, not because she loved him, but because she’d been trapped into it.
Then, almost before he realized what he was doing, he flew — through the storm, through the blur of glass and rain — until he reached the balcony of the penthouse.
He landed soundlessly.
The curtains fluttered. Inside, a single lamp glowed, soft and amber, casting her shadow against the far wall.
She was standing before a full-length mirror, her wedding gown draped loosely across the mannequin beside her — silk white, shimmering faintly under the light. Her hair fell around her shoulders, unpinned, as if she couldn’t bring herself to finish the transformation.
She looked up, sensing something.
“Clark?”
He stepped forward from the shadows, rain dripping from his jacket, his expression a mixture of guilt and something deeper.
“I had to see you,” he said.
Her lips parted, a thousand emotions flickering across her face. “You shouldn’t be here.”
He took another step closer, his eyes searching hers. “But I couldn’t let tomorrow happen without saying—without trying—” He faltered. “You don’t belong in this world. Not with him. You…you are miserable. You can’t marry him.”