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Lex woke up early, just like every other Sunday morning. He expected to be greeted with a steaming cup of coffee, left by his wonderful housekeeper, who knew just how to make it, with the newspaper, and with silence.
Not with high-pitched voices squealing "Here comes Peter Cottontail, hopping down the bunny trail" and a rabbit in bed with him.
Granted, the rabbit was Ferdinand, and they'd come to an understanding at Christmas. Lex didn't eat the bunny, so the bunny was Lex's pet. Nowhere in that agreement did Ferdinand to get sleep in bed with him. Nor did he get to wear a big purple bow.
And yet, there he was, in Lex's bed, on Lex's pillow, in fact, wearing a big purple bow. Sitting beside a plastic yellow basket.
Lex just sighed. "Good morning, Ferdinand." He petted the little white rabbit gently, and it twitched it's little pink nose. "Yes, I realize it's early. What are you doing in my bed, Ferdinand?" Another nose twitch, and Ferdinand hopped over to the basket, and started nibbling on the cellophane, apparently bored with the conversation. "Clark put you up to this, didn't he?" That didn't even get a twitch as the rabbit kept nibbling on the cellophane. "Come on, you can't eat that. You'll be sick." Lex sighed, deeply, sat up in bed, and tucked Ferdinand in his lap, away from the plastic.
That got him a little bunny sneeze, and Ferdinand looked up at Lex. Lex untied the ribbon around his neck, leaving him in just the purple collar with his name on it, and tossed the ribbon on top of the cellophane wrapped basket. "What did we do, Ferdinand? And where is that perky little bastard?"
"That perky little bastard is right here!" Clark said, popping in the doorway, whistling the Peter Cottontail song as he carried in the breakfast tray.
At least, Lex assumed it was a breakfast tray, until he got a look at it. "Why did you bring me colored eggs?"
"Dyed, Lex. Dyed. They're Easter eggs."
"Easter eggs," Lex said, in the same tone of voice Jonathan Kent usually reseved for "Luthor."
"Yup. See, you're going to help me finish dyeing them. Then? They'll dry while you open your basket, then we'll have an Easter egg hunt, which we couldn't have without Easter eggs." Clark was grinning. "Ferdinand helped, cause he's the Easter bunny today."
"Easter eggs. Easter bunny. I didn't realize you were five, Clark." Then he blinked. "This... is my.... my... Easter basket?" Lex could barely choke the words out. He needed... well, actually, he needed to just kill Clark and get it over with. But he'd settle for a cup of coffee. "You're joking."
"Nope, not joking. Happy Easter." Clark shoved the yellow plastic basket into Lex's lap.
"There'd better be coffee in this basket," Lex groused as he picked Ferdinand back up before he knocked over one of the dye cups.
"Hey, nosy. Watch it," Clark said, picking up the dye cup before it spilled. "Okay, Lex. Here's what you do. The dye's all ready, I made it downstairs. All you do is, dip the egg in the dye, then take it out when it's the shade you want, and tada! Easter eggs! I made extra purple dye, cause I know you like purple, plus! Stencils! For designs." He brandished the stencils and paint markers with glee.
Lex looked from Clark, to the dye, and then to the rabbit. "Can you say, justifiable homicide, Ferdinand?"
*sneeze*
"I knew you could." He looked back up at Clark, who's grin hadn't faltered in the slightest. "You must be joking."
"Okay, fine, be a Grinch. I'll dye the eggs while you open the basket." Clark started putting eggs in the dye cups, still whistling Peter Cottontail in time to the laptop on the dresser, which Lex finally realized was the source of the hellish voices that had woken him up this morning. "So, open it already."
Lex looked at the little plastic yellow basket, packed with fake purple Easter grass, and wrapped in purple cellophane and a purple ribbon. "Are you trying to tell me something with all the purple, Clark?"
Clark easily juggled the eggs in and out of the dye. "You're the one who's always wearing it, I thought you liked the color. Besides, it's the color I always associate with you. Purple equals Lex." He took the dyed eggs out, put them in the foam egg carton, and put fresh eggs in to be colored. "I got three dozen, we're going to be here a while, so you got enough time. Open it already."
Lex left one hand on Ferdinand and the other rose to untie the bow on the top of the package. It gave easily, and Lex put it to the side with Ferdinand's ribbon before peeling the purple plastic off next, and setting it to the side.
He expected chocolate and toys, standard Easter basket fare, and was slightly surprised with the contents of this one.
A pocket-sized volume of Walt Whitman poetry. An assortment of five little packets of Godiva Chocolatier coffees. There were three little lavender-foil wrapped bunnies, which Lex seriously hoped were made of solid, dark chocolate. Then... "Plastic eggs, Clark?" He looked up to see his friend blushing brightly, and didn't notice Ferdinand chomping on the purple grass. "Clark?"
"Just... you know, crack them open, like a real egg." Clark didn't raise his eyes from the dye cups until Lex cracked the first plastic egg open.
A little folded up square of red paper. Lex unfolded the paper into the original heart shape, and smiled at the blocky handwriting across it.
I love you.
Lex folded the heart back into the little square, put it on the bed beside him, and cracked open the second egg.
Two ticket stubs, from The Two Towers, which was the first movie they'd gone out to see together. Lex put the ticket stubs aside too, and opened the third egg. A small 8-ball rolled out, and Lex chuckled softly at the memory of the pool table they'd broken. The last egg was heavier than the others, and it rattled.
"Wait!" Clark's head shot up as he heard the rattle. "Don't open that one yet!"
Lex paused in mid-crack. "Why not?"
"Because I gotta tell you where I got it first." Clark wiped his hands on a towel sitting on the tray, and then carefully set the tray on the floor. "Mom found that, years ago, in church. When she tried to return it... well, the person who owned it said to keep it, as a reward for being honest and doing the right thing. Mom gave it to me, right after Christmas." Another light blush. "I think it was her way of saying it's okay. So I wanted to give it to you."
"Now can I open it?"
"Yeah."
Lex finished cracking the egg open, and pulled out a silver locket on a fine silver chain. "This... this was my mother's." His fingers slid over the familiar engravings on the front, the two entwined L's on the back, and then opened the clasp to look inside. On the right side, a small picture of Lillian and her husband, dressed in their wedding finery. On the left, a picture of Lionel holding baby Lex. "I asked my mother about this necklace once, and she said that she guessed she'd lost it, but it would make it's way back to me if the time was right." He tightened his fist around it. "I didn't know what she meant, or that your mother had it."
"Mom said it was right after they just adopted me. She took me into Metropolis to go to church with her father, only he wouldn't come because of Dad. So she and I went by ourselves--I don't remember much, just... flashes, you know? But she said she found the locket on the way out, and she knew who it belonged to. And since your dad helped with the adoption... well, my mom tried to give it back to your Mom, but she wouldn't take it back. She told my mom to keep it. But when Mom found out I was... well, seeing you, she gave it to me, and I'm giving it back to you."
Lex picked up Ferdinand in one hand, and leaned over to kiss Clark, holding his mother's necklace in the other hand. "Thank you, Clark. Thank you so much."
"You're welcome." Clark returned the kiss, and then blushed. "It's... not exactly a normal Easter thing, but I knew you'd like it." He nudged Lex's shoulder. "Keep going. There's more stuff in there."
Lex leaned over and pulled out a small wooden box from the bedside table. He opened the box, and the watch his mother had given him was sitting right there, waiting to be worn. Lex carefully added the locket it to the box before pressing a soft kiss to the wood and setting it back in the drawer. Then, he went back to his basket. He pulled the three little bunnies out, finding them to be larger than he'd thought--almost the size of his hand. He set them to the side, and then laughed. "Toy soldiers?"
"Yeah, for the fort. If you want, we can paint them to look like Greeks. I just didn't have time." Clark grinned as he picked up the bag of little green soldiers. "I mean, we can do creative anachronism, right? It won't matter if there's an AK-47 in the middle of the catapults."
Lex took his little bag of soldiers away from Clark, and stacked it with the rest of his Easter booty. "You are not putting those things in my Trojan War reproduction. I will, however, buy a fort so they will have a proper place to work." He shook his head, still fuzzy due to the lack of coffee. He pulled out the purple Easter grass, and laughed again. KING OF THE WORLD, proclaimed the coffee cup, and it was filled with chocolate Godiva eggs.
"Well... I know it's a few years early, and I know you're not thirty yet, but when I saw it... I couldn't resist it." Clark bounced onto the bed beside Lex. "Well? Did you like your basket? Are you ready to hunt eggs? And are you ready for lunch? Cause mom's been cooking all week. Smoked turkey, honey glazed ham, green beans, corn, potato salad, macaroni and cheese, sweet potato casserole, rice and giblet gravy, deviled eggs, homemade rolls, broccoli casserole, squash, congealed salad, and um, lots of fresh fruits and desserts, and cheesecake."
Lex's eyes boggled. "That's... a big meal. Just... you and your parents?"
"Yeah, usually."
"Usually?" Lex's head was throbbing. "Clark? Why don't you go downstairs and start... hiding the eggs. I'll take a hot shower, find a cup of coffee, and join you in a few hours, when the urge to commit homicide has passed." He was petting Ferdinand as he spoke, and it was only the presence of the bunny that kept him from attempting to strangle his young lover. "It's eight in the morning, and a little too early to think of *that* much food."
"No it's not!" Clark was still bouncing. "All you have to do is say that yes, you'll come. Mom invited your dad, but he said no, so you're safe. It's just us, and Dad promised to be on his best behavior and lock up the shotgun."
"All right. yes. I'll go. Now get out. I need a shower. I need coffee. Then I'll be human again. Take Ferdinand, put him in his cage, and for the love of God, Clark, *please* turn off the laptop before I throw *it* down the bunny trail!"
Clark tucked Ferdinand into his elbow, petting and scratching behind his ears as he closed the website. "They don't exactly make Easter music, so this was as close as I could find." Ferdinand's cage was sitting on the floor, and Clark tucked him away, and made sure that he had enough bunny chow and water in his little bottle before petting him through the wires of the cage and grinning at his lover. "Pre-coffee perkiness?"
"Is what's going to get your ass kicked if you don't LET ME HAVE MY COFFEE!!" Lex growled it. "Get. Out. Now. I love you. I do. Get out before I have to have you killed." Clark grinned as he gathered up his dyed eggs, and walked out of the bedroom. Lex waited until he was gone before dropping to the floor in front of Ferdinand's cage. Ferdinand was busy eating bunny chow, and Lex reached in through the cage wires and stroked his fur. "Easter bunny my ass." He got up and headed into the shower he so desperately wanted, and thudded his head softly against the tile wall.
- = - = -
Ferdinand kept munching on his bunny chow as he was petted and stroked and then twitched his nose at the dresser. As soon as the shower turned on, Lex's KING OF THE WORLD coffee mug was suddenly filled with fragrant, hot coffee. Ferdinand put his head back down in the bunny chow bowl and started eating again.
What was the good of being the Easter bunny if you couldn't do a miracle once in a while?
The End