Thanks for the feedback. I'm glad you all liked the story.
Virginia: Lois discovering that she liked Clark more than she realized because suddenly he a) might not be available, and b) wasn't who she had thought (i.e. a liar). And that realization made her take the first afternoon off in who knows how long to go chocolate ice cream diving. Poor Lois! Apparently for all her nonchalance while Clark was asking her out, she really does like him after all.
Lois really has fallen for Clark by this point in the series - she admitted as much when she was getting ready for her wedding to Lex and at the end of TOGOM, even if she was the only one who heard her either time. It's just easier to stay with the status quo. I really think that she would have agreed to go out with Clark when he asked in the episode if Jimmy hadn't interrupted. And, of course, "don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone..." (and then something about parking lots... or whatever.)
It was great to see a different girlfriend in this scenario (apart from the usual Lana cameo).
He's got a string of girlfriends in the comics, but very few of them would work easily in a Lois & Clark context. One of these days I'll find a way to work Luma Lynai into a story...
Queen: Incidentally, when Lori showed up in the 90's wedding comic, it baffled me then as now how someone with *mind-reading* abilities could be so obtuse with other people!
My theory is that she has to deliberately listen to people's thoughts, and she doesn't just automatically pick up stray thoughts around her. Mermaid culture would deem it impolite to pry into other people's heads without permission. But yeah, you'd think that she would act different if she could read minds. I've always wondered why Lori went out with Clark to begin with if she had no intention of sticking around. She was pretty heartless to string him along like that, and I don't see any way that she wouldn't have known how attached he was getting.
Morgana: How cool is that! The only other woman I can remember who Clark proposed to. This story was sweet and wonderful, a delicate hug on a hot day.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Why now after all these years did she decide to accept Clark's proposal of marriage? What has she been doing in the meantime? Living in Atlantis or did she create a life for herself on land?
There are a number of questions Ms. Lemaris has left unanswered. Is there a sequel lurking out there?
I had some ideas about what Lori had been up to, and I was going to work it into the story, but I decided that I didn't really care what she was doing. I was more interested in how Clark's experience with her would change his approach to his relationship with Lois.
Lori has been in Atlantis this whole time. One of my early ideas was that Lori got married (to Ronal, her alien merman husband from the comics) and had a baby boy, but they both recently died in an accident, and Lori went to Metropolis to get away from everything and decided that since Clark had declared his undying love for her way back when, he would probably still be in love with her, so she could hook up with him and not be lonely. Then things just started to get dark, so I decided that she's just been a lonely spinster who never found the right guy, and since her ailing father recently died and she no longer has to care for him, she's finally free to leave town and pursue her lost love.
As far as a sequel goes, I don't plan to write one, but I've been toying with an alternate ending for this one, picking up where Clark tells Lois he's Superman. I wrote this ending before I wrote the rest of the story, and it's satisfyingly waffy, but I don't think that Lois would actually react like that. I'm kind of mired down with trying to decide how much of the rest of the episode to work into it, since things wouldn't resolve for at least a day or two, and by that time in the episode Lex was back and they were staking out Bender's boat. I'm becoming less and less certain that I want to bother writing the alternate ending, though.
John: This was a really good story. I like that Clark decides to tell Lois the truth. It just reinforces how right he is that he has no connection with Lori that she comes so out of left field with her acceptance of the proposal.
Thanks. And thanks for your beta reading it for me.
The way I see it, if Clark had dated Lori in college and proposed to her before telling her about his powers and it blew up in his face, he wouldn't make the same mistake with Lois. It's always bothered me that he proposed to Lois before she really knew him well enough. It's all well and good to say that "Clark is who I am, Superman is what I do," but it's not really accurate. She still has to put up with him running off to be Superman. It's not exactly a small detail.
Mouse: Wow! I really enjoyed this! That was a curveball I didn't see coming. And I liked that she announced to the whole newsroom that Clark couldn't have kids and Lois latched onto that. Well done!
Glad you liked it!
