Chloe didn't live in Smallville when the meteor hit, but she's heard the story retold countless times. She knows how many farms burned down, which families lost their homes. How long passed before the first living X-File cropped up--Darryl Jenkins, who regained a thumb he'd lost twelve years earlier in a hunting accident.

And of course, that Lana's parents had died. No one was ever likely to forget that. People still gave her pitying looks in the street, mumbling about the 'tragedy of it all' as Lana herself walked around carrying a piece of meteor rock in a chain around her neck.

How very morbid, Chloe always thought.

It's hard not to feel sorry for Lana though, kneeling in the dirt in front of her parents' gravestones, a perfectly Dickensian image of an orphan.

Lana inhales the scent of the white lilies before setting them down on the ground. Chloe adds the flowers she picked from Nell's flower shop, a small bouquet of carnations that looks droopy next to Lana's.

"You really miss them, huh?" Chloe is rarely tongue-tied, but there's something about Lana's expression that makes her feel as if they're somewhere no one's supposed to talk, like in a church.

Lana rises, brushing the dirt off of her knees. "Every day."

And Chloe nods, like she understands what it's like to be orphaned. She doesn't really. Tries picturing her own mom and dad gone, and can't. They're a natural part of Chloe's life, just like Pete's dating disasters and the sweet sincerity of Clark's smile.

"You know what the weirdest thing is, though?" Lana says. "Sometimes I really don't remember much when I think about them. Isn't that terrible?"

Here's probably where Chloe is supposed to nod again and say something novel about keeping the memory alive. But as her father Gabe likes to say, she never really was one for tact. Or lying.

"I don't know," Chloe says with a shrug. "Maybe you don't need to remember everything. Maybe it's fine if you don't."

The sunlight hits her face and Lana's smile turns into something crooked, wavering. "Yeah, I guess." She bites her lower lip, face scrunched up in a grimace Chloe knows would've given her a monkey face, but somehow it's still attractive on Lana.

Then Lana turns towards her, slipping a soft hand in hers, and everything that Chloe was going to ask seems to have flown from her head.

She'll never become a good reporter with Lana around.

Lana's voice, like honey. "Tell me about Metropolis."