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It was not that he hated living in Keystone. The city was alright enough, he supposed. It was not that he hated living with the Garricks, either. They were beyond alright. They were really kind and made Bart feel somewhat similar to how he felt around Grandma Iris.
It was just that it wasn't Manchester.
He had lost Max. He had lost his friends because he had lost Max, because he couldn't stay and he couldn't tell Preston the truth and make distance mean absolutely nothing. Because now he needed to make calls and plans and convoluted reasons to go see them. It was all incredibly frustrating when he knew he could be there in no time whenever he wanted if only he could tell them the truth.
Bart was screaming into his pillow when his phone rang. Dammit by blink-182. Kon. Kon, probably the only great part of moving to Kansas.
He picked up the phone, discarding his teenage angst faster than the speed of light.
"Hey, Imp. Do you wanna come over? There's a fair and-"
"Bethereinthreeminutes," Bart didn't even let him finish the question.
He put on probably the first combination of clean clothes his hands could reach and stormed down the stairs announcing he was going to Smallville. Not asking, just… Announcing it, because Joan never told him no when it came to seeing his friends. Bart thought that, being older than she looked, she probably understood losing friends a little too well.
"Will you be back before dinner, darling?"
"We are going to the fair… So I guess not. But I won't wake you up, I promise!"
"Then you need some money, here. Have fun and don't get in trouble!"
Bart took the twenty dollar bill and tucked it safely inside the zipper pocket of his cargo pants, hugging her as he said a "thank you," just before running out of the house.
The cloud of dirt announced Bart's stop before he could shout "hi."
Summer days seemed to last forever, and Mrs. Kent liked to spend the last few hours of them reading on her porch.
"Good evening, Bart."
"Hi, Mrs. Kent! Is Conner still home?"
"He's getting ready, why don't you go up and help him choose before he makes his entire room a mess, dear?"
Bart laughed a little, nodding and giving her a soft "thank you" kiss on the cheek before running inside at normal people speed. No powers inside the house. He could respect that rule.
He didn't bother to knock on the door. He had seen Kon shirtless more times that he could count. Though, with the level of clarity his memory reached, he probably could count them if he set his mind to it for a few seconds. That would be an interesting exercise on brain organization… Maybe he could try it that night as a counting sheep strategy.
All silly thoughts about his complete disregard for his best friend's privacy were cut short when he finished his small fight with the pile of clothes blocking the door from opening and slipped in through the crack.
"Mrs. Kent wasn't joking," he said. "Why so much fuss about your clothes? Finally done with that boring t-shirt?"
"Oh, shut up," Kon replied, throwing a hoodie at Bart's head, which he didn't bother to dodge.
A hoodie. Bart stopped to question why he would still have one of those out with how hot the summer was getting, how hot Kon himself ran. But he didn't say a thing.
"It's just a fair."
"I've never gone to one. I don't know what to w-" He stopped as he finally looked at Bart in all his disaster skater glory. Dark green cargo pants, Robin vans and a red t-shirt so oversized on him it looked like Kon could wear it with no issue. "Oh."
"I've never felt more insulted in less sounds," his complaint's falseness was quickly revealed by explosive laughter. "Just wear whatever. You'll look great anyway, because you always look so great it is unfair to the rest of humanity, you dick!"
Bart tossed one of Kon's many sleeveless band t-shirts at him and the other boy put it on without bothering to look at which one it was.
"As I was saying, unfair."
The speedster took the liberty of breaking the no powers rule just to put all of his friend's clothes neatly folded on top of his bed. He was eager to leave for the fair, his head already racing, thinking all the dubious food he could get. He had only gone to one of those before, with Preston and Carol and the others, and it had been the funniest day ever. Even though they had only managed to get into one of the attractions and the food had mostly been painfully out of budget after a couple things. Carol's brother didn't have the budget, Preston wouldn't even ask and Helen had to explain to Max that Bart could do nothing with two dollars in the current economy. That's why Bart and the others were quick to announce they would all just pull their money together and choose as a team. No friend left behind.
Kon caught the very direct message, finishing up the organizing as Bart tapped his foot on the door so fast he was making him think of a Bugs Bunny short.
"Let's go, Imp," he finally announced, wrapping an arm around Bart's shoulders as he lead him down the stairs.
He was warm and still had the lingering smell of the home made soap Mrs. Kent liked making lingering from the shower he probably had taken after a morning of farm work. Bart could say that he liked it, but that would be no surprise. He liked almost anything, if not everything, about him.
Kon let him go once they reached the door, using his hand to pick up his wallet, chain and all, and keys from the wooden drawers by the door.
"Have fun and don't get in trouble!" Mrs. Kent told them as they walked out the door, which got a giggle out of Bart as he wondered if that grandmotherly advice was some kind of universal constant.
They said goodbye before Kon threw Bart on his shoulder like a potato sack, flying them both off closer to the fair.
Bart found that, much like in Manchester, Smallville's town funfair happened in a patch of dry land that seemed to be less than a place the rest of the year. Close enough to the heart of town for most children and teens to get there by foot or bike, but distant enough so most people wouldn't suffer a few days of no sleep.
He thought the sunset looked beautiful from above, even if he was watching it in a less than comfortable position. It was easy to stay still while Kon held him.
They landed far enough not to be seen and made their way into the fair in a powerless race. Bart was first, laughing, running backwards just to be funny. They stopped as they joined the last wave of teens crossing the invisible threshold demarcated by going from cobblestone to gravel.
"First stop: cotton candy," Bart announced.
Kon just nodded, accepting him as a guide to everything in regards to the fair without question. The sounds from the temporary rodeo arena could still be heard loud and clear, but neither of them showed an interest in going in. Bart's yellow eyes gleamed with excitement at the prospect of getting into the less than perfect metallic behemoths. Kon thought he looked pretty under the multicolored lights from the bumper car's ceiling.
He stopped for a second to greet a classmate and, by the time he looked back to Bart, he was gone. One blink later, the speedster was in front of him, handing him a cotton candy the size of his head.
"Which one do you want to try first?" Bart asked, ripping away pieces of the pink cloud and putting them into his mouth as his fingers got stickier and stickier. "I like the olla. I don't really know what it's called. A kid at my school called it that and it stuck. It's… That huge murder roundabout over there!"
Bart's cotton candy was almost only a stick by the time he used it to point.
"That sounds like something we should try before everyone is drunk," Kon agreed. "Try not to fly off."
"As if! Did you forget I can carry you?" Bart hit him in the arm for the jest before running to the line, bouncing in place with the biggest smile.
Once they were in, people's attitudes seemed like the funniest thing to watch. At least in Smallville, they called that "murder roundabout" a "Gravitron." Having been in zero gravity many times, both boys thought it could not compare. At least, until Bart decided that sitting on the bench and holding onto the railing was a bit boring and let himself slip off into the barely padded floor, timing his jumps and dances so physics were always on his side.
Show off, Kon thought. But he would have clapped if he didn't need to perform normalcy.
Bart landed his last jump just wrong enough to come tumbling straight into the hand Kon had kept free in case that happened. A little bit of TTK that just looked like a happy coincidence. He pulled the speedster into a hug as Bart clung to him, cackling and laughing like that had been the most fun he had experienced in weeks.
When they got down, Conner got a couple comments about Bart, who, forgetting to pretend he was dizzy, had already ran off to the line of another ride.
"Where did you find that guy?" Was a comment he got twice, he filled it under "teenage appreciation that sounds kind of mean." And replied with "He is a family friend."
The next attraction on Bart's list looked like a metallic octopus with hydraulic arms that went up and down in sudden movements. For Kon, the funniest part of it was the way his friend clung to his arm like a reflex at the first drop, quickly steadying himself afterwards.
If Bart were more capable of shame, he would have probably gone red in the face.
Then came a stop for hot dogs and drinks way too big for anyone to finish. At that point, Bart was starting to run out of his small budget, so Kon bought them both the tickets for the bumper cars without saying a thing.
"I am a great driver," Bart said.
"And a terrible liar."
"You are sooo going to regret that, Conner Kent!"
He did not, whatsoever, regret that.
It was incredibly entertaining to avoid the other teens and focus on pushing the speedster against the railings over and over as he tried his best to land one decent hit on him.
Bart got an absurdly big Poxy Monster plush in one of the games and Kon took a picture on his phone that, between the lights from the funfair and the dark of the night, would look grainy at best. The speedster regretted not bringing his camera. He would next time. And maybe they could invite the others, too.
Was it bad that he hadn't thought about them until now? That he was happy this was a Kon and Bart thing instead of a team one?
"We should go, Pa said the fireworks are tonight." Kon said.
"Can't we see them from here?"
"I think I might know a better spot."
Bart only nodded and, affectionate as he usually was, held onto Kon's hand. It wasn't that he was ignoring the bad looks they had been getting here and there all night. It was just that… He didn't realize the reason for them until he heard a slur being spat as a guy probably twice his age bumped into him.
He just shook his head.
"Ignore it," he said.
"But."
"Ignore it." It had happened before, in Manchester with Preston, and he was sure it would happen again. "Let's go see the fireworks!"
There was less laughter on that walk, less talk in general. Both of them silent, uncomfortable… Still holding on to each other because they weren't letting one idiot dictate the way their affection was shown.
Kon's great idea was a deserted kid's park a few streets away from the funfair. Private in its loneliness.
Bart thought he was right. This was a lot better.
"Are you alright?" Kon asked after they had climbed their way to the top of the wooden castle-like structure.
"Why wouldn't I be?"
Kon just shrugged and Bart scooted a bit closer, letting his head rest on the boy's shoulder.
"I mean… He wasn't wrong. There is nothing straight about me," Bart joked. "I don't even believe gender is a thing! It's just some silly 20th century thing I have to remember."
Kon would have laughed under different circumstances, "It was still wrong."
"Does it… Make you uncomfortable? That the wayIamwithyoumightmakepeoplethinkthatyou-"
"No." Kon cut the rambling short, hugging Bart by the shoulders.
A comfortable silence set itself between them as the sky filled with color and sound.
Kon thought Bart's yellow eyes looked almost golden under the fireworks. The more he looked at him, the less his partner looked like a human being. No, he was a daydream. And that thought caught him completely off guard.
He wasn't bothered by others thinking he was like Bart. He didn't care one bit. That wasn't a lie, because as he had been slowly realizing for a long time now… There was nothing straight about him either. At first, that idea had scared him to no end. He had tried to repress it. To pretend. But the more he looked at his friend, mesmerized by the distant lights, the more he realized the reason he hadn't been able to take his eyes off him all night.
Or, maybe, he was wrong.
He figured there was a really simple way to find out.
"Hey, Imp…" Bart's head jerked immediately, his attention fully on him. That mesmerized look still on his eyes that made Kon understand how sailors felt when sirens sang to them. "Can I kiss you?"
About a million thoughts crossed Bart Allen's mind in the instant it took him to recover from the shock of that question.
At first, he laughed. He thought Kon must have been joking. Then, he stopped as he noticed the look in his eyes. He reached out, a hand placed on Kon's cheek to draw him closer as he nodded ever so slightly.
Was he an experiment to Kon? Was this just an attempt at maybe making him feel better? Bart knew, deep in his heart, that he did not care. Whatever it was, whatever happened next, he knew Kon loved him just as much as he loved Kon. Even if it wasn't in the exact same way. And he knew he would love to know how kissing him felt, even if it was only once.
Their lips where so close the air was becoming one and, in the end, it was Bart who couldn't take the new tension anymore, joining them as the last of the fireworks in the sky mixed with the the crackle of lightning all over his body. Electrifying. That was how kissing Kon-El felt like. Even if it was the softest, most chaste kiss of his life.
It didn't last that way, though, because merely a second later, Kon slid his fingers into Bart's unruly hair, keeping him close as he deepened the kiss. As he made their lips separate and interlock.
Bart pressed their foreheads together after a few seconds. He wasn't ready for more than that. The idea of more made him squeamish and uncomfortable.
< I love you, > He said, fully aware Kon wouldn't understand the words.
The sentiment, however was understood all the same.