Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic Wrong Clark (103/???)

Wrong Place, Wrong Time, Wrong Clark TOC can be found Here

Part 102

Part 103

*****************
Moving Backwards
*****************

Lois took another glance around the office. Everything was almost back to normal.

Perry had already barked at them about today’s headlines. Clark had just bolted out of the office with some lame excuse about going to meet a source, followed by Jimmy on the way to the photo lab. Ralph was hitting on some new-hire researcher, and three, two, one, SLAP, just got his usual response. Cat still hadn’t made it into the office, and it was almost eleven fifteen. Who would believe thirty-six hours ago, most of these people thought the world was about to end? Another day, another investigation, another headline. They were only as good as their next story.

Speaking of which…

Lois picked up her telephone and dialed Lex’s private line. The number he apparently gave her during the whole asteroid crisis was one which bypassed Mrs. Cox. All the better, in Lois’s opinion. Her investigation would run more smoothly without having to deal with links in Lex’s chain.

“Lex Luthor,” Lex’s familiar voice called out to her over his speakerphone.

He seemed distracted as if busy. His reaction to this call would tell Lois how serious he was about her. Now, all Lois had to do was make herself believable.

“Hi, Lex. It’s Lois.”

“Lois,” Lex said, and she heard the sound of him taking the phone off of speakerphone. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”

“I wanted to thank you again for the other night,” Lois said vaguely, lowering her voice. “Your consideration of me and my needs, as well as your generous offer were very kind. I’m honored, and more than a little flattered, that you thought of me.”

“Think nothing of it, Lois. It clearly wasn’t the correct fit for you,” he replied dismissively. “Thankfully, Superman saved the day, and we didn’t need to use it.”

“Yes, thankfully,” she said softly. She hadn’t actively pursued Lex since Superman came on the scene. Lex would become suspicious if she suddenly started to do so, now. She needed to drop enough of a seed for Lex to contact her later. “Well, that’s all. I just wanted to tell you I appreciated the gesture, and that I hope… no… never mind. That’s too much.” She was going to suggest that they remain friends, but that sounded false to her own ears. “Just thank you, Lex. That’s all.”

“What? What’s too much?” he asked, his curiosity having been stirred.

“It’s nothing, really, Lex,” she stressed, hoping he would drop the matter. She was embarrassed that she had spoken her thoughts out loud.

“Have you given any consideration to my proposal?” Lex asked, changing the topic.

“Excuse me?” Lois asked, her heart racing. She took an extra glance at Clark’s desk to reassure herself that he wasn’t within earshot. Had Lex thought that his ‘companion’ speech in the bunker was a proposal of marriage?

“To dinner, say once a week, to discuss current events. I’ll talk to you about what I’ve heard. You’ll talk to me about what you’ve heard,” he said. “It would be mutually beneficial.”

Oh, yes. She remembered now. His request that she become his mole. She hated the idea now just as much as she had when he had proposed it after her early tip regarding Rourke’s sabotage saved the Luthor Technologies’ contract with the Navy.

“Just as friends,” Lex clarified.

After what he had said in the bunker, and having most likely put the hit on Clark because of her, Lois knew Lex was lying. She wondered why he was trying so hard to get an ‘in’ with her. Was information on Daily Planet investigations that important to him? She doubted it. Was he really ‘in love’ with her as her vision had showed? She hoped not. Or was it something else entirely, something she was missing? One thing was for certain: Lex Luthor wanted to possess her, but she wasn’t going to let that happen.

“Just friends?” she echoed. She could do that. She wouldn’t tell Lex anything, but dinner with the slimeball might just be the foot in the door she needed to infiltrate his organization. As friends she could make sure that he knew that she and Clark were just partners, and maybe convince him to drop the hit. Too many botched murder attempts and Lex might get curious about both Clark’s lack of a history and his lucky streak.

She must have sounded hesitant enough for him to go into hard sell mode. “Perhaps if we had started these dinners when I had first suggested them, you could have learned before Superman of Nightfall’s approach and recommended to him that he get a second opinion,” Lex went on.

Yeah, right. If Lex had wanted her to know about Nightfall, he had had more than ample opportunity to disclose that information to her. Lois made a note to herself to talk to Professor Daitch again about his data on the initial Nightfall asteroid, and how it possibly could have changed from almost a year before.

“Just friends sounds nice, Lex,” she replied, making her voice waver slightly as if with held-back emotion and then added softly as if to herself, “I could use a friend at the moment.”

“Oh?” he nibbled.

Lois smiled. And now to withdraw the bait. “Well, at any time really,” she said, adding her disclaimer. “I would love a dinner with no strings attached.” She hoped she wasn’t being either too obvious or too subtle with what she was implying. “When were you thinking?”

“This Thursday,” Lex suggested. “Eight o’clock? Shall I send a car?”

She looked up and saw Cat arrive at her desk. “Thank you, Lex, but I can drive. I’d hate to inconvenience a friend.”

Cat raised a brow at this pronouncement, obviously eavesdropping, which didn’t surprise Lois in the least. Cat then mouthed the word ‘friend?’

Lois waved her off.

“No inconvenience at all, Lois, but if you’d prefer to drive, I’ll send over a guest keycard for the parking garage under LexTower, so you won’t have to park on the street,” he volunteered.

“Thank you, Lex. Until Thursday,” Lois said, hanging up.

“What are you doing?” Cat hissed over their shared cubicle wall.

“My job. Lex is a source. True, one that has to be coddled, but still…” Lois shrugged.

Cat looked her directly in the eye and said, “You and I both know what he is.”

Lois stood up and walked to the conference room. Cat didn’t immediately follow, so Lois jerked her head towards the door with a pointed expression. Cat took her time, putting away her purse, turning on her computer, and flipping through her messages, before heading towards the conference room.

“Took you long enough,” Lois said sourly, after Cat had shut the door.

“I appreciate you asking nicely this time,” Cat said, running a hand over her auburn locks, which Lois had grabbed the last time she had wanted a private conversation with the gossip queen. “I can’t believe you dumped Clark to date Lex! Where’s the woman who was groaning about what a creepy billionaire he is the other night? I liked her!”

“Lex is a source, and only a source,” Lois spat back. She disliked the warm fuzzy feeling she felt when Cat had said she had actually liked her. “We are having dinner on Thursday night – as friends – as part of my investigation.”

Cat crossed her arms and seemed to be waiting for more.

“You know why Clark and I broke up,” Lois went on, pointing a finger at Cat. “It was for his protection.”

“That’s not exactly how he spun it,” Cat retorted.

Of course, Clark had called Cat with all the gory details.

“As if I would’ve brought up that explanation,” Lois said. “I let him think he was protecting me, like he did by getting you out of his apartment when that man died there.”

“Okay, fine. So, you’re investigating Lex Luthor about Clark’s abduction?” Cat probed with enthusiasm.

“He’s a source!” Lois repeated, and then lowered her voice. “Look, when I was at the bunker the other night, Lex hinted that the powers-that-be knew Nightfall was coming last spring, and knew that it was supposed to come close, but not hit.”

Cat’s jaw dropped open. “Nightfall wasn’t supposed to hit?”

“That’s what he said,” Lois said, leaving out the part where Professor Daitch had given the same information to Superman. “Somehow Professor Daitch’s data changed between last spring and last week to show Nightfall had altered direction. That sounds fishy. So, unless the asteroid had outside influence which made it change direction…”

“Someone altered Professor Daitch’s data?” Cat guessed.

Lois nodded, a proud teacher to her pupil.

“If you think that was Lex Luthor,” Cat said. “You need to tell Clark, everything. Now.”

Lois rolled her eyes. How would telling Clark keep him safe? It wasn’t as if Clark and Lex were bosom buddies and hung out. They avoided each other like arch enemies. “Lex is my source,” she lied, holding up her hands to indicate that Cat should listen. “Who do we know for a fact had access to Kryptonite?”

“Lex Luthor?” Cat guessed hesitantly, but even Lois could tell Cat wasn’t that stupid.

“Bureau 39. When we were in Smallville, last fall, Clark told Trask that he was Superman…”

“Is he an idiot? Trask?” Cat gasped, glancing around. “Wait. How do you know he did that?”

“Clark told me,” Lois said.

“Wait. Clark told you in October that he’s… and…?” Cat stared at Lois, her mouth hanging open in disbelief. “I can’t believe that I thought you were ever a good reporter.”

Lois pinched her lips together. “What I had been told was the Kryptonite kills Superman,” she explained, lowering her voice to a whisper. “End of story. The end. Dead. Not that it took away his powers. Clark had not only been physically sick, he was covered in mosquito bites, had a gash over his head, was spacey as all got out, and Trask had shot him. Why in the hell would I have believed him?” she asked. “Clark told me that he had said that to Trask, so the psycho wouldn’t hurt the Kents.”

“So you thought he was buying Superman time to come and rescue him?”

“I thought he told Trask that, so Bureau 39 would think that Kryptonite had no effect on Superman, was a useless weapon, and, therefore, abandon it,” Lois corrected.

“Oh,” Cat said, finally understanding Lois’s logic. “But it does hurt him.”

“Which leads us back to today. Who do we know had access to Kryptonite in the past? Bureau 39,” Lois checked the facts off on her fingers as she listed them. “Who do we know who wants Superman dead? Bureau 39. Who do we know who has the capability to sneak into EPRAD and change Professor Daitch’s data? Bureau 39. Who do we know, who isn’t above kidnapping? Bureau 39. Who could have Kryptonite in the vicinity of where they were holding Clark, unknowingly exposing him to it, and would have no problem disposing of his body in Hob’s Bay? Bureau 39.”

“You think Bureau 39 is behind Clark’s attempted murder?” Cat asked.

“No. The Hare Krishnas. Of course! Bureau 39!” Lois insisted. She paused a moment and thought through her own arguments, realizing that they actually had merit. Had she been wrong about Lex? She recalled that copy-cat apartment down in his bunker, and knew deep down in her core being that she was right. She would let Cat think otherwise for the time being.

“If B-52s are back, don’t you think Clark should be told?” Cat hissed.

Maybe Lois had given Cat’s brain cells too much credit for figuring out Clark’s secret. “Cat, the B-52s are a music group. Bureau 39 is a covert pseudo-military anti-alien group.”

Cat waved the difference between the two away as if the right name wasn’t important.

Lois shook her head, wondering how Cat had never been sued for the information she printed in “Cat’s Corner”.

“So, they know?” Cat asked.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Lois said. “If one of their other members heard what Clark told Trask, they could know, or they could have just been extremely lucky.”

“Hmmm,” Cat contemplated this information for a minute.

Lois moved to the door to return to her desk.

“Lois,” Cat said hesitantly. “When you were… I mean, when you have dinner with Lex, does he always send a car to pick you up?”

Lois shrugged. “Generally. Why?”

“Just curious. Did the town car drop you off in front of LexTowers?” Cat asked.

“No, he has a private parking garage under the building,” Lois explained. “The car usually stopped next to Lex’s private elevator, and Nigel St. John, and on occasion Asabi, would escort me upstairs to Lex’s penthouse.”

“So, at any time did you ever pass by the LexTower doorman?” Cat pressed on.

“Maybe if I had driven myself, or had to leave early due to a story.”

“Interesting,” Cat purred.

Lois didn’t think so and continued out to her desk.

***

When Clark returned from the hold-up at the auction house, his latest Superman adventure, Jimmy informed him that Lois was at the Courthouse. Eugene Laderman’s trial was back on after a month of continuances. Clark sighed, and thanked Jimmy.

Clark felt like an idiot. Why had he opened his mouth last night? He never should have told Lois that he had come there to break-up with her, even if he had decided that he couldn’t go through with it. How could he have let Lois dump him? How?

He had her exactly where he wanted her. He loved her, and she loved him. Not that they could do anything but date and kiss from now until kingdom come, or Herb returned, whichever came first. How could he argue against her feeling horrible about kissing ‘another man’? He had tried to tell her that he was Superman, tried to explain that she hadn’t technically cheated on him, and tried to convince her that she was better off with him than without him, but nothing worked. She would not listen to reason, but she had listened to him when he said he was scared for her safety.

Lois, who wasn’t afraid of anything, had agreed with him that her life could be in danger, should they continue to date. Sometimes, he just couldn’t understand her pigheaded logic. It was one of the things that he loved most about her. She kept him on his toes, constantly surprising him, not necessarily in ways that he liked, but often – as with both of his birthday gifts and how she wanted to hear about his amnesiac fantasy about Meena – in ways he would never forget. Lois was like one gigantic puzzle, which he could happily spend his entire life trying to understand.

Clark already missed her kisses, her touches, and even her glances at him from across the room. Okay, they still shared those, but it wasn’t the same.

He closed his eyes and tried to concentrate on his Superman story, but his fingers merely hovered above his keyboard.

“You all right there, son?” Perry asked, passing by his desk.

“Fine,” Clark replied, setting down his fingers.

“Did Lois tell you what happened yesterday?” the Chief asked. “Why she froze?”

The faint memory of the kisses he, as Superman, had shared with Lois, both before and after dealing with Nightfall, flashed across his mind. “Froze?” Clark inquired, refusing to allow Lois to get a bad rap from missing the Superman exclusive due to his own weaknesses.

“With Superman?”

“Did she? I hadn’t noticed,” Clark replied, focusing on the screen, so Perry wouldn’t worm out of him that Lois had been anything but cold with Superman. He never knew making out with Lois while he wore the uniform could be so hot. “She left me some good quotes. That’s why her name was on the byline with mine.”

“You didn’t interview him at the same time then?” Perry asked.

Clark cleared his throat at that physical impossibility. “No. Yesterday was a busy day for Superman, so he gave half his exclusive to her and half to me, between rescues.”

“Uh-huh,” his boss replied, studying Clark.

“Superman stopped a hold-up at an art auction this morning. I’m typing it up now,” Clark said, trying to change the subject.

“Great,” Perry said absently. “I’ve never seen Lois drop the ball like that before; I wonder why she did. Many of the ones with the greatest potential burn out early and fade fast.”

Okay, enough, Clark thought. Every reporter was allowed an off day, even the great Lois Lane. “Sir,” he said, turning and facing his boss. “If I let you in on the secret, will you promise to keep it off the record from everyone, especially Lois?” Mostly because she wouldn’t like him covering for her in this way.

Perry’s eyes widened and he leaned close. Even the great Perry White wouldn’t turn down a chance to hear gossip.

Clark lowered his voice. “Lois threw me a bone,” he admitted. “She felt bad writing up a story she knew was essentially mine. I had apparently had the ‘Superman Returns’ story last Friday, before my abduction, and she didn’t want to steal it. She didn’t know that I had recovered my memories and could write up the story on my own, and therefore expected me to call her for her assistance and shared byline. When I didn’t call, she slammed me for it.”

The Chief nodded. “I wondered about the tension at this morning’s meeting.”

Thankfully, Cat hadn’t been there to comment on said tension, because her description would have been the closest.

“Maybe what you need is a few days apart,” Perry suggested. “Let her cool down. Why don’t you go visit your folks in Kansas? Get yourself out of Dodge, so to speak, and away from the giant target painted on your chest… back! Painted on your back! And finish recuperating from your dip in Hob’s Bay?”

Clark flushed, not only because the Kents weren’t his actual folks but because of his horrible treatment of them on the telephone the night before last. “I’d like to see them, and check on the farm.”

Perry nodded. “I’m sure they’d love to see you too after your ordeal. I take it flying isn’t easy for them?” Then his boss made the oddest expression. “Plane fare being so expensive and all.”

“Um… yeah, that, and…”

“As we told you before, Jerome, you’re always welcome to be our son. I’d love for you to call me ‘Mom’,” Martha had said to him the other night on the phone before he had said those horrible things and basically hung up on them. He would be surprised if they wanted to have anything more to do with him.

“My dad,” Clark continued. “He’s in a wheelchair. A broken back from falling off a ladder a couple of years ago.”

“Oh, son, that’s right. I’m sorry,” Perry said, appearing quite contrite. “I remember that now from the photo Jimmy took of…” He coughed. “Them… with Superman, when they gave him back his spaceship that Lois had recovered from Bureau 39.”

“Lois and I recovered, sir,” Clark corrected. “We both found it.”

Perry smiled. “Just give her a few days to remember how terrified she was when you were missing, and she’ll snap back to her ol’ self. Oh, you better let Inspector Henderson know you’re heading out of town though.”

“I’ll do that,” Clark said softly as Perry walked off.

Had Lois been ‘terrified’ when he had disappeared? Clark’s barrel of guilt overflowed. He had never doubted Lois’s love and affection for him, especially after hearing all those kind things she had said to Cat, of all people, about how much she loved him.

“How are you holding up?” Cat asked, appearing out of nowhere.

“We’ll get through this,” he said, reassuring himself more than her. “I’m fine.”

“Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Cat purred, leaning over his desk and giving him a tantalizing view of her assets, which only served to remind him of when, drunk on Revenge, Lois had made the same move.

Clark focused on his computer monitor, completely uninterested in Cat’s assets.

“So, should I bring anything to dinner tonight?” she asked.

He almost canceled, and told her what Perry had suggested, and Clark had agreed to: that he needed some time out of Metropolis for a while. Then he recalled that this dinner wasn’t about him and his problems with Lois. He was supposed to be thanking Cat for all her assistance during Nightfall and to discuss her difficulty getting over Phil, or the idea of Phil. He had learned during his bout with amnesia that he’d been much too selfish in their relationship, and this dinner was supposed to be a way to work on his vow to be a much better friend to Cat.

“Bring your true self, Cat, and leave the sex kitten at home, please,” he said. “And a bottle of red wine would be nice.”

“Your loss,” she called, heading back to her desk.

Clark smiled, knowing that he gained so much more by having Cat as a friend than a lover. If he could only convince her to let others see her true self more often, but that would be as easy as trying to talk Lois out of a Double Fudge Crunch Bar.

***

Lois ran out of the courtroom and over to the bank of telephones. It wasn’t as if there was a break in Eugene’s case. It still seemed to be a slam dunk for the prosecution, but she only had a limited time to do research and contact sources on her other stories while tied up in the courtroom. It was one of the things she hated most about covering murder trials, the lack of freedom.

“Twelfth Precinct. How may I assist you?” the desk sergeant asked. It was one of her favorite things about the Twelfth, their lack of asking ‘What’s your emergency?’ every time they answered the phone.

“Is Inspector Henderson in?” she asked, pulling her other notebook out and dropping her Eugene Laderman trial notebook into her briefcase.

“Who’s calling, please?”

If Henderson was screening his calls because of her… “Lois Lane, Daily Planet.”

“Hold, please, I’ll check if he’s available,” the desk sergeant replied.

“He better be,” Lois grumbled. She only had a ten minute recess.

“Inspector Henderson,” a familiar voice said into the line. “Do you have some new information for me, Ms. Lane?”

“And good morning to you, too, Inspector,” she quipped back. Information for him. Ha! “I was hoping you might have some information on Joe Rory for me.” So far, her sources were coming back dry. She needed better sources.

“Oh? Am I working for you, now, Lane?” Henderson countered.

“You’ve got to give me something, Henderson,” she said, tapping her pencil against her notepad. “Did something show up in Rory’s personal effects, tying him to Clark’s abduction? Like Clark’s wallet? Have you found anything linking Rory to whom he might have been working for? Did you find the car he used to transport Clark to the marina or his boat? Anything?”

“It’s an on-going investigation, and I cannot comment, Lane,” he replied.

“Oh, come on, Inspector. We’re talking about my partner’s life here,” she said. “What if he’s attacked again while you’re sitting on your laurels?”

“What happened to you never letting Kent out of your sight?” he returned. “Do you even know where your partner is, Ms. Lane?”

“Clark has his memories back, with the exception of his abduction, and he doesn’t need a babysitter, I believe were his exact words,” Lois said, pondering over Henderson’s question. “What do you mean?”

“Excuse me?”

“What do you mean, ‘do I even know where my partner is’?” Her heart started to race. “Did something happen?”

“Don’t you know, Ms. Lane?” Henderson asked with some surprise.

“I’ve been in court all morning covering the Laderman trial. Is Clark all right?” Lois said, her palms starting to sweat. Did Lex strike against Clark again already?

“As far as I know,” Henderson replied, and Lois exhaled. “He called me yesterday afternoon to inform me that he was heading out of town to visit some relatives.”

“What?” Lois growled. “Are you sure?”

“He didn’t tell you?” the Inspector was practically tittering.

And they say that reporters are gossips.

“Did you double check? Maybe he was abducted again, and his kidnappers forced him to say that to you. He wouldn’t leave town without informing me!” Lois insisted.

“Oh? Trouble in paradise?”

“We’re just partners! I’ve got to go. Court’s back in session,” she said, hanging up. She flipped to the front of her investigation notebook to where she had written the Kents’ phone number, and then pulled a roll of quarters out of her briefcase. She wished she had remembered to grab her mobile phone from the charger this morning. Picking up the line, she dialed the Kents’ number, and then inserted the correct number of quarters.

“Hello?” Jonathan’s voice answered the phone after several rings.

“Jonathan? It’s Lois. Is Clark there?” she asked, her heart racing to hear confirmation and her blood boiling for the same reason.

“Morning, Lois. Jerome’s still asleep,” Jonathan informed her. “He took the redeye from Metropolis last night and got in very late.”

Lois’s heart plummeted into her stomach. Clark left town? Without telling her? “You mean you-know-who Express?” she snapped, knowing full well that there was no redeye between Metropolis and Smallville, or anywhere else in Kansas for that sake.

Jonathan cleared his throat. “Is there something wrong, Lois?”

“Yes. You tell that lunkhead that when there’s a price on his head, he shouldn’t leave town without informing me! I don’t like being played the fool by learning of it third-hand,” Lois went on, wiping the dampness from her face. “We’re partners for heaven’s sake!”

“Lois, would you like…”

“I’ve got to go. Court’s back in session,” she said, slamming down the phone and marching back into the courtroom.

*

Jonathan looked at the phone, and then back at Clark who was now standing next to him and holding out his hand for the phone. Jonathan shook his head and replaced the receiver. “She hung up.”

Clark winced, despite already knowing this truth.

“So, you don’t need me to repeat the message?” Jonathan teased.

“I doubt the Irigs from their farmhouse need you to repeat the message,” Clark replied, sitting down at the kitchen table and rubbing a hand down his face. “Apparently, she didn’t get my messages.”

Martha entered from the back door. “What’s with all the shouting?” she asked.

“Lois called,” Jonathan said, rolling over to the table and pouring a fresh cup of coffee for his wife. “You didn’t speak to her in person?” he asked Clark, raising a scolding brow.

Clark sighed. “It’s complicated.”

“Oh?” Martha murmured.

Clark didn’t miss the glance she exchanged with Jonathan. “Lois broke up with me at dinner on Monday night,” he explained.

“Oh, honey. Why?” Martha said, setting her hand on Clark’s and sitting down next to him.

Clark shrugged. “I’m not quite sure. Lois says she feels guilty for kissing Superman, and I think she’s also mad at me for forgiving her. She says she needs some time and space to work through it.”

The Kents exchanged another look.

“I know, I know,” Clark said, holding up his hands. “I tried to explain to her that it wasn’t cheating because I’m Superman, but she wouldn’t let me get the phrase out. Then I started feeling guilty because I hadn’t told her sooner.” He groaned and dropped his head to the table.

“So, she still doesn’t know?” Martha asked.

Martha had already gone to sleep when Jonathan had let Clark in the night before. Clark knew he should have just waited until this morning to fly out here, but he loved the idea of leaving Metropolis and arriving here under the cover of darkness, and Jonathan had said that he’d wait up. He now enlightened her with the highlights version of what had occurred the day he went to save the Earth from Nightfall the second time. He had already told Jonathan what had happened the night before, when he arrived.

“No,” Clark grumbled. “I keep trying to tell her, but something keeps interrupting me. She might have been slightly mad because I told her I had been planning on breaking-up with her when I came over on Monday night.”

“Oh, Jerome, no! Why?” Martha asked.

“Well, I planned to but then I couldn’t go through with it, because I love her so much… I… I couldn’t do it. One of these days I’ll learn when to keep my mouth shut and when to speak,” Clark said, pouring himself a cup of coffee. “I was going to do it for her safety, because someone is trying to kill me, and if that someone also knows that I’m Superman, and even if he doesn’t, I wouldn’t want Lois to get hurt from an attempt on my life. Then I realized as we were sitting there eating dinner that I couldn’t do it. I could give up everything else to protect her, but her. Lois is my life.”

“Then she went and dumped you?” Jonathan summarized.

“Basically. She did it ‘because she loves me’,” Clark scoffed.

“Ouch,” Jonathan winced.

Martha took a sip of her coffee. “Do you think she still has feelings for Superman? Did she officially break-up with you to see if anything would develop there?”

Clark’s jaw dropped. That thought never occurred to him. He had spent so much time trying to figure out how to ease her guilt by telling Lois the truth that he hadn’t thought too deeply about if she had other motivations than what she told him.

“I don’t know. Maybe. Possibly,” Clark muttered. He thought about their whole conversation again. “I don’t know. She said that she loves me, but that she needs time to work something out. She said it was only temporary, and I should trust her.” He tried to remember what she had said to Superman, but those thoughts seemed more fuzzy. “She told Superman that even though she loved him, she was in love with Clark, and that there couldn’t be ‘us’ – a ‘Superman and Lois, us’.” He scratched his head. Had she changed her mind? “I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

“Well, that sounds like something you need to find out, son,” Jonathan suggested.

“You’re right, Superman, one kiss changes everything,” Lois had told Superman after their first kiss.

“Yeah,” Clark murmured, cringing from the very thought. He had built up a relationship between Clark and Lois for the last six months, since Superman had taken Lois into the mountains and broken up with her, only to destroy everything with one stupid amnesiac kiss.

***End of Part 103***

Part 104

Comments always welcome.