Smallville: Telekinetic (Lex Luthor/OFC fanfic)

Tilting at Windmills

Sixteen year-old Chloe Sullivan walked into the Talon just as a bunch of rowdy high-school guys were on their way out.

'Whoa! Worlds collide!' said one of the guys. He tried to dance around Chloe but bumped into her, practically knocking her over. She lost her balance and would have fallen if not for a pair of strong arms that caught her. Meanwhile, the guy who'd almost knocked her over continued out the door without a backward glance.

'You okay?' Strong Arms asked.

Chloe righted herself and then checked him out. His hunky arms were attached to an equally hunky torso, which was attached to a Ryan Phillippe-esque face. 'Your friend's a jerk,' Chloe told him, shaking back her short blonde hair.

'He's a friend of a friend,' Strong Arms said. 'My real friends are only semi-jerks.' He grinned at her. 'I'm Drew Keller. You're...?'

'Chloe Sullivan.'

'Chloe Sullivan,' he repeated, still grinning. 'I think this is what's commonly known as 'meeting cute'. So, do you live around here or - '

'Yo, Keller, let's go, man!' One of his friends had stuck his head inside the door. 'We're already late.'

'Be right there.' Drew turned back to Chloe. 'Well, I guess this is boy meets girl, boy loses girl. Anyway, I apologize for my friend of a friend.'

'Apology accepted,' Chloe said. 'Nice meeting you.' She watched him walk away. He looked just as good going as he had coming.

'As we used to so cleverly say in grade school, take a picture it'll last longer,' Lana Lang said to Chloe as she sailed by. She carried a platter loaded with plates of mud cake and cappucinos.

'Forget it,' Chloe muttered. 'Guys that cute are dangerous.'

It had been an unusually warm summer night for Smallville, Kansas - the Meteor Capital of the World - and Chloe had been home alone, monumentally bored. She'd driven over to the Kent farm to see what Clark was up to. Jonathan, Clark's dad, had been clearing out the barn and had told her Clark had gone to the Talon.

The Talon, the town's old movie-theater, had stood empty for years. When LexCorp had expressed an interest in the old building and thought it might make a rather nice multi-storey parking lot, Lana had been horrified. The Talon had been special to her parents, it's where they had metand because of that it was special to her. Not only that, but the Talon was a part of the community, a place where friends and family used to gather and be together. Smallville didn't need a great big, ugly multi-storey in the heart of town.

Lana had presented her set of ideas and plans to Lex Luthor, son of multi-billionaire Lionel. He was more approachable than his father was. She wanted to turn the Talon into a coffee-house-cum-book-store with room to re-open the theater too. She had worked for days on the figures and when she had presented the portfolio of papers to Lex, he had been impressed and admired her efficiency and obvious ardour in wanting to keep the place as a part of the community. It would be a little gold-mine, Lana had assured him. The money he would put into the place he would reap in less than a year's time. It was a sound business venture, that and the fact that he knew his father had expressed a brief interest in the building himself only made Lex all the more determined to out-bid him. There was no love lost between father and son. And when it came to their very separate businesses, sometimes it was just plain old all-out war.

So he had bought the building and in remaining as a 'silent partner', Lana had been allowed to keep her dream. On one condition. She had to manage the place and hire her own staff. Lex had enough on his plate ensuring the smooth running of LexCorp. Lana had proved that the place really was a little gold-mine, clearing sometimes three thousand dollars in a week.