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“Are you sure that we’re going in the right direction?”
“Yeah! I think it’s less than a mile to go now.” Jimmy peered from the compass in his hands to meet Lex’s gaze. The soft expression in his eyes warmed him despite feeling out of his element in the middle of a forest.
Lately, Jimmy was insistent that he’d surprise Lex with the ‘best date ever’. Their six-month anniversary was approaching, and with how often Jimmy mentioned it, he assumed that his boyfriend wanted it to be special. Still, he couldn’t fathom why he suggested a short weekend camping trip to watch the Perseid meteor shower. Even for a meteor shower, he dreaded the prospect of camping and the idea of taking an entire weekend off seemed impossible. Jimmy was brimming with earnest enthusiasm and his eyes made it difficult to say no.
The wilderness was foreign to him. After all, Lex grew up in Metropolis and it wasn’t like his family took vacations, much less ones in the wilderness. There could be all manner of dangers here, like bears, venomous snakes, or sheer cliffs. Thinking about it was enough to conjure visions of cautionary articles featuring their deaths—ones that rangers might assume that they were idiots. It took a lot of coaxing, even with Jimmy swearing up and down that he was an experienced camper and that he knew the area. Apparently, he once went hunting for bigfoot in this area, which was enough that Lex finally believed him.
Jimmy pushed aside some branches, revealing a small campsite that sat at the edge of a large clearing, with a small fire pit nearby. “My dad used to say that I should always build furniture or a tent when I’m dating somebody. He thought that any relationship worth keeping needed that kind of teamwork.”
“Is that why we’re here?”
“Nah, I just thought that this might be a nice way to see the stars.” He flashed a charming smile and winked. That gesture always managed to make Lex’s heartbeat catch in his chest, an admitted sappy observation, but one to which he’d grown accustomed.
They worked together quietly and while Lex helped, Jimmy seemed to take the lead with ease and comfort. While Lex was still hypervigilant, expecting a looming threat from the wilderness, Jimmy’s confidence felt reassuring. At dusk, they finished their work and sat next to each other. Jimmy brought a simple meal of sandwiches, and they ate in silence until the night buzzed with the sound of crickets and cicada cries.
The last of the sun’s light faded, plunging them into darkness lit only by their small campfire. Jimmy moved their chairs together and wrapped an arm around Lex’s waist.
“Growing up, I camped in this area a lot. There’s an army base only a few miles away. My family spent a few years there before we were restationed. I went camping here a lot.”
“On your own?”
“Yeah. I used to go looking for Bigfoot, but the only thing that I ever found was a huge crocodile monster. That was the first real thing I found.”
Lex chuckled and wrapped one arm around Jimmy’s shoulders, laying his head against Jimmy’s. “How is it that you always manage to find trouble?”
“I’m just lucky that way, I guess.”
Lex glanced up to the constellations, with eyes tracing the sky. When he found Cassiopeia, he looked South until he found Perseus’ main star, Beta Persei Lex pointed up toward it to guide Jimmy’s eyes. “There, that’s Perseus. The meteor shower is named for that one.”
Jimmy situated himself closer to Lex by wrapping an arm around his waist, using the angle to pull in for a warm, gentle kiss. “Beautiful.” Jimmy’s tone was a soft whisper tickling between their lips, warming him more than a campfire flame possibly could.
A meteor’s arc crossed the sky and Jimmy grinned with delight. As more crossed the horizon, the sky itself seemed to tinge a deep red, with purple moving in at its edges. Lex watched his boyfriend’s expression expecting to explain, but based on his wide eyes and mouth, Jimmy could recognize the aurora on his own.
The color eventually passed. Jimmy pulled Lex onto his lap and kissed his hand.
“So, best date ever, or what?” he asked.
Lex rolled his head to the side, feigning thoughtfulness at the question and said, “As long as we aren’t attacked by bears, I’m pretty sure it will be.”
“You’ve never really been camping before, have you?” Jimmy rubbed gentle circles on Lex’s hand.
“No! I grew up in Metropolis, why would I be used to that?”
Jimmy shrugged. “Some people take their kids camping.”
“And for the ones that don’t, they get their experience by running into an escaped government experiment?”
“If you’re lucky, like me.” His tone was light, but far from sarcastic. In another scenario, Lex would worry about getting attacked by Mothman or the Jersey Devil or some other supposedly debunked B movie nonsense—if he thought that those were real.
Lex turned to look at Jimmy and leaned in close to kiss him. “If you’re going to be lucky, maybe wait until there’s more light to see by?”
Jimmy’s smirk was enough to know the kind of joke that he was about to make, and Lex silenced him with a kiss, murmuring against his lips. “I’d forgotten how much I wanted to see this as a kid. It’s better seeing it with you.”
Much later, after the campfire died down, they fell asleep, limbs entangled and faces oriented to the mesh roof of the tent, where the odd shooting star occasionally lit the sky. Jimmy stirred in his sleep to see a pair of glowing, yellow eyes watching them. He binked blearily, willing them to disappear. Lex slept contentedly next to him, and he wanted to bask in the warmth of the moment. Tonight, he just needed everything to be perfect.
The eyes disappeared. Jimmy drifted out of consciousness again, mind free of the usual pull of heroism and villainy that defined their relationship, no matter how much they tried to avoid thinking about it. Here, Lex was just Lex, and that was enough to make everything perfect for him.