Big thankies to all you FoLCs who keep reading this, and all of my gratitude to Carole who keeps BRing for me despite her overloaded schedule.
Now, here goes part 5. Remember:
< > denote characters’ inner thoughts.
<< >> denote characters’ conscience replies.
TOC here From Part 4: He turned around, took off and soon disappeared. When they couldn’t see him anymore, Martha leaned on Jonathan’s shoulder and started to laugh loudly, and Jonathan’s smile widened.
“He’s in love!” Martha exclaimed.
“I noticed,” Jonathan said, staring at the sky.
“I wonder, how long will it take until *he* notices, too?”
“Who knows?”
Jonathan put his arm around Martha’s shoulder and they both stayed at the door, staring at the sky, happily smiling.
Part 5: Later that evening, Lois was home, nervously pacing back and forth, a bowl of chocolate chip ice cream in her hands and a piece of paper squeezed between her fingers.
Clark hadn’t looked well that evening. He looked scared, almost hunted.
She had asked Jimmy, who was handling the computer files, for Clark’s number. But now she didn’t know whether she should call him or not. What if he got angry with her? Maybe he just wanted to be left alone.
<Anyway, I’ll call him. He can’t get angry with me because I care about him.>
She stood still for a second, biting her lip and thinking about what she had just thought. She cared about him? And what if calling him was too much?
<Heck, I’ll call,> she thought, and, leaving the ice cream on the coffee table, she sat on the couch and grabbed the receiver.
At that particular time, Clark had been sitting on the bed of his hotel room at the Apollo Hotel, searching the paper for any apartments to rent. He had noted a couple that seemed to be suitable for him and was going to call the owners, when his phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Clark, it’s Lois.”
“Oh, hi, Lois.” He tried to sound cool, although he was feeling a little uneasy. Why was she calling him?
Lois took a deep breath. “You were not looking so well this afternoon, and I thought I should call to make sure you’re okay. Are you? Okay, I mean.” She shook her head, silently cursing her babble that – as always – came up at the most inconvenient time.
“Yes, I’m fine.” He found her interest in him a bit scary. He couldn’t find anything else to say, and wondered if he should just say ‘bye’ and hang up. But then he thought it would be rude, and decided not to do it.
“I’m glad,” Lois said, not less scared herself. He didn’t seem to be in a mood for chatting. <Better safe than sorry.> “Then, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow?”
“Yes, sure. Bye.”
“Bye.”
Lois hung up and fell on the couch. Okay, it wasn’t that bad. He didn’t sound all right, that was sure, but he hadn’t insulted her.
She rolled her eyes. He would never insult her. He didn’t seem to be such a guy.
She grabbed the ice cream again and resumed eating.
-----
Clark, after hanging up, laid for a little longer on the bed, staring at the telephone.
Lois had just called him. She wanted to see if he was all right.
Was she interested in him?
Could be.
<<Are you interested in her, too?>> a voice ironically asked.
<Could be, too.>
<<Come on, you don’t know?>>
<I’m not sure. I just met her yesterday.>
<<So what?>>
Clark sighed. He *could* be interested in her. He was at a loss when he was talking with her. Wasn’t that a sign?
He rolled his eyes. A sign was not enough. He would have to wait, if he wanted to be sure. This way he’d be sure about *her* feelings, too.
Yes, that was a good idea. He’d wait, and then he’d decide what he’d do.
He took the newspaper in his hands again, found one of the ads he had noted and began dialing the phone number provided.
-----
The next day, when Clark arrived at the Planet, Lois was already there, sitting at her desk, taking a look at the newspaper and drinking her coffee.
“Good morning, Lois,” he said, walking by her.
“Clark!” She rose, leaving the coffee and the newspaper on her desk. “How are you?”
“I’m fine,” he said, stopping right in front of her. “Thanks for calling yesterday.”
“I was worried about you,” she timidly said, bending her head.
“I really wasn’t all that fine, but it’s okay now. I guess I haven’t adjusted myself to the Metropolis lifestyle yet.”
“Yes, that may be it,” she smiled.
“So,” he changed the subject pleasantly, “what do we have for today?”
“Oh, nothing.”
“So what are we doing?”
“You know, when we have nothing, Perry usually assigns us lousy dog-show stories and stuff like this…” She gave him a bright smile, and was happy to see he gave her an equally bright one back.
“So what has he assigned us for today?”
“Nothing yet. We could go ask him, or we could wander the streets looking for a big story.”
“Does it work?” he said, surprised.
“Sometimes. You get to find new sources… You know what a source is, don’t you?”
“Of course, Lois.”
“Okay, so we can go see some of my sources, although I doubt they’ll have something, they would already have called me otherwise, or we can just go searching for anything unusual, which is more difficult, but sometimes works, or we can just go to Perry and ask for a boring assignment,” she concluded, raising her eyebrows in a playfully silly way.
Clark gave it a thought for a second. “It’s your choice. *You* are the top banana.”
Lois blushed. “Forget I said that.”
“Why? You were right.”
“No…” Lois felt like going to hide under the desk, but knew that it wouldn’t be a good idea. She just avoided looking at him and concentrated on playing with her fingers instead. “…It was a bad thing to say. I mean for you… You must have felt useless.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, but that’s what I wanted you to feel. I like to be bossy. Ask anyone.”
“No, I believe you,” he teased her.
She looked up at him, smiling at his comment. Then, her face became evil. “You know, I never apologize.”
Clark remained silent at that. He was afraid to draw a conclusion out of what she had just said; he was afraid he might misunderstand her.
“What do you mean by that?” he finally asked. He knew it was one of the dumbest things to say, but it sounded safe.
“I mean that,” she said, taking a few steps towards him, “if I apologized to you yesterday, it must mean something.”
-----
Lois was now standing just inches away from Clark, and wanted to slap herself.
<What did I just say? What did I just say?!?! What am I going to do now?!?!?! Oh my God, I’m so out of here!>
She was scared to death and wanted to run away, but did nothing more than just stay there, still, with the same evil grin on her face. She could feel it now seemed fake, but it was better than showing out the anxiety that was taking over her right now. If Clark understood what she was feeling…
No. Never. She’d rather die.
She studied his expression, searching for a sign of what he could be thinking of her. She found him confused and nervous.
<Okay, okay, I need to find something to say, or God knows what he’s going to think of me.>
“It meant that, if you ever tell anyone about it, you’re dead.”
<<Do you think this is a kind thing to say, Lois?>>
<Okay, okay, it may be not, but it worked. It worked. Didn’t it?>
Clark smiled understandingly. “Don’t worry about it.”
<Yes, it worked.>
“Thanks. I knew you’d understand,” she said, making her voice sounding wry. She just wished she hadn’t given herself away.
“So what are we going to do?” he asked again.
<I’m gonna run,> she thought. She felt like hunted; she wanted to get away from him as soon as possible, and, to her disappointment, her nervousness was beginning to show.
“How about we split?” she said, with an effort to smile.
“You mean we go out researching… not together?” he asked, unsure.
“Yes! Err… we’ll cover more space this way.”
“Okay… But… I’m not sure what to look for.”
She managed to give him a sorry-I-forgot look, instead of the please-someone-shoot-me-because-if-I-spend-two-more-minutes-with-him-I’ll-go-crazy that would match her feelings perfectly.
“You know…” she started, faking being cool. “Anything. Like a man dressed in black with his hands in his pockets…” she said, waving her hand.
He processed the information in his mind. “Oh, well. So, are we going?”
“Are *we* going?” she asked, a bit terrified.
“I thought you wouldn’t mind if we took the elevator together…” he said, taken aback by her reaction.
“Oh, no, of course not. I… err, never mind.” She took her purse. “So, are we going?”
“After you, ma’am.”
“Oh, thank you, sir,” she smiled, passing in front of him. When he could only see her back, her face filled with horror again. <I can’t wait to get out of this building. I need air. Fresh air.>
-End of part 5-
