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These wonderful message boards are all of two years old today! 
Today is also Pam Jernigan's birthday, <b>and Rivka's birthday. Many happy returns to both of you!
To the two of you, and to the boards, I offer up this little anniversary fic. Enjoy! (I hope!
)
~ Rival Derailed ~ “Back off, Linda. He’s taken.”
Clark Kent stared at his partner, dumbfounded. Had someone kidnapped Lois Lane and replaced her with Cat Grant while his attention was distracted?
If there was one thing he’d depended on where Lois was concerned, it was that she would never lay claim to him openly like that. That was the whole point. Sure, she hated that Linda was flirting with him, making obvious her availability and willingness. But Lois was supposed to react the way she’d done time and again over the past couple of days: a façade of rolling-eyed irritation about the fact that another woman was coming on to him, together with insistent denial that she was feeling anything even remotely close to jealousy. Yet at the same time she would find excuses to snipe at him. Open hostility towards Linda, both to the other woman’s face and to him, was also to be expected, together with an undercurrent of possessiveness - but not, of course, because Lois was jealous.
That was how she was supposed to behave. That was how she’d been behaving. That was how he’d expected her to carry on behaving.
She wasn’t supposed to stake a territorial claim on him.
So much for the plan. He and Perry would have to do some speedy rethinking. Unless, of course, he took the obvious way out right now. It would be simple. It would take only a few words, and perhaps an incredulous, sneering laugh.
All he had to do was deny that Lois had any claim on him at all.
Then he could get up, abandoning her, and walk Linda to the train station as she’d asked. And stay away from the Press Club for considerably longer than the short walk would take.
That would absolutely guarantee the end result they’d planned for, and quicker than he’d expected.
But...
Lois had said he was taken.
Lois had implied that he was taken
by her.
How could he ignore what that meant to him? Even if she’d only said it as a tactic to make Linda stop coming on to him. Even if she’d retract it once they were alone.
And yet he had a job to do. A mission to accomplish. A mission which could only be accomplished
successfully by antagonising Lois badly - which, part of him had thought when the plan had been formulated, might even be a good thing.
She’d been blowing hot and cold with him for a while, after all, with no serious intent in mind. Her behaviour occasionally came close to flirting, while at other times she made him feel like an irritating bug she was about to step on. As soon as Linda had come on the scene and made her interest in him clear, Possessive Lois had appeared - but that hadn’t meant anything. She didn’t want him. She just didn’t want anyone else to have him.
This... this was unbelievable.
He smiled regretfully.
“I’m sorry, Linda.” Turning to Lois, he gave her a blazing smile and reached for her hand. “Like Lois said, we’re seeing each other.”
Lois gasped. And Linda looked shocked.
“Anyway,” he continued, getting to his feet, “I’ll be happy to walk you to the station, Linda. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes, honey,” he added to Lois.
The last thing he saw, as he walked out of the Press Club with Linda, was Lois’s wide-eyed, almost thunderstruck, expression.
**********
Why had she said that? What had
possessed her?
Lois pushed her plate away and buried her head in her hands. Of all the idiot things...!
What must Clark be thinking?
And, worst of all, what was she going to say to him?
Okay, so she’d been trying to get Linda to stay away from him for the last couple of days. But that
wasn’t because she had any personal interest in Clark! Like she’d told Linda in the restroom, she was just trying to protect Clark from her scheming. That she wouldn’t let Linda use him and discard him. And that was because Clark was her
friend. Nothing more than that.
Now... well, okay, she might well have succeeded in warning Linda off, though even that wasn’t assured. After all, Linda hadn’t exactly respected boundaries before, had she? She’d moved in on Paul despite knowing that Lois was with him.
Lois sighed. It was even possible that, by staking a claim on Clark, she’d only presented Linda with more of a challenge. Now, instead of just flirting with Clark, she’d go all out to steal him away.
She was probably starting right now...
A squeak of dismay escaped her and, embarrassed, she looked around cautiously. Good. No-one seemed to have noticed.
But really, what had she been thinking? She’d made things worse, not better! What was it about Linda King that the woman only had to be in the vicinity for her to start acting like a complete moron?
And Clark had said he’d be right back. If he’d meant it, then he’d be here any minute.
Honey...Oh, god. Oh, god...
She couldn’t face him. Not now. He’d want an explanation, and she simply didn’t have one to give him. Not to mention the fact that she wasn’t even sure she could look him in the eye.
Grabbing her purse, she slid quickly out of the booth and practically ran for the door.
*********
“I thought you said your relationship with Lois wasn’t defined?”
Linda was clinging to his arm. He almost laughed. She was being so obvious. Not that he would have minded too much if his original plan had still been on track.
“Well, it wasn’t - then.” But it had sure become defined in a matter of seconds! To outward appearances, anyway. Though going along with it had left him with a bigger problem. How was he now going to achieve the objective of finding out what the Star was up to?
Though... maybe the original plan wasn’t so dead in the water after all. The way Linda was looking at him...
She really wasn’t a woman’s woman, was she? What sort of woman would make a play for someone else’s boyfriend?
If it wasn’t for the fact that he had an ulterior motive, he’d give her a brush-off she couldn’t misunderstand. But... Instead, he smiled at her.
She smiled back in what he recognised as a deliberately sultry manner. “Well, if you ever feel like
re-defining yourself... personally or professionally...” As she trailed off, she stroked her free hand down his arm.
Well, his plan was definitely still a possibility.
“Well, here’s the station.” He detached her hand gently but firmly. “Goodnight.”
Her expression made it clear that she was about to detain him further. Her eyes half-closed, she curved her mouth into a seductive smile and tilted her head to one side. “Clark...”
He shook his head, smiling apologetically. “I have to go, Linda, Lois is waiting for me.”
For a moment, she looked as if she would protest, but then she shrugged, as if to concede defeat. For now, anyway, her expression suggested. “Goodnight, Clark.”
**********
Clark hurried back to the Press Club. But the table was empty.
He checked his watch. He’d been gone less than ten minutes. Why hadn’t she waited?
But then, this was Lois. The irrational frequently seemed to be rational as far as she was concerned. With a wry grimace, he left the club to head over to Lois’s apartment.
He’d take the slow route. That would give him time to work out how to provoke the reaction he needed to get the plan back on track.
**********
She was busy. She was very busy. Far too busy to worry about what her partner might be getting up to with Linda King.
So much for him agreeing with the lead she’d given him. He’d still left with the witch!
What was it with men? Did they all think with their trousers? Could none of them see past a cleavage and a... well, a maybe sort of, if you looked at it from the right angle, pretty face? She’d thought Clark was better than that. But then, he’d been letting Linda flirt with him ever since she’d had to introduce the two of them. He’d let her waltz off with him at Preston Carpenter’s ball. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, he’d even gone to lunch with her.
So, if he was so
obviously interested in Linda, why had he backed her up when she’d said he was hers?
Oh, what did it matter! She didn’t
want Clark to consider himself hers, anyway! That was why she’d left the Press Club, after all. She still had to decide what the heck she was going to say to Clark when she saw him.
Maybe she could just say that she was sick of the way Linda was pestering him. Batting her eyelids at him. All over him like a rash. That it was getting in the way of the two of them doing their
jobs. After all, Linda worked for a rival newspaper. One, moreover, which was scooping them
all the time. The last thing they should be doing was allowing a Metropolis Star reporter to hang around them.
Maybe he’d buy that. Or maybe not. After all, he’d already accused her of being jealous just because she’d tried to warn him off that... that
person who had the temerity to call herself a reporter.
Sighing, she applied herself to the tiles around her sink. How could her kitchen have got into such a state? She hardly ever used it! It wasn’t as if she was one of those messy cooks who spilt bits of food or liquid everywhere. The place should be pristine!
Scrub. Scrub. Cough because that cleaning cream smelled
awful. Scrub. Pause to wipe hair away from face. Grimace because cleaning cream smears ended up on hair.
Okay, now she remembered why she hated clean -
A loud, insistent knock sounded at the door. Clark. It had to be. Oh, god. Oh, god. She wasn’t ready to see him yet.
She could just not answer. Pretend she wasn’t in...
“Lois? Lois! I know you’re in there!”
Too late. Though how did he know she was there? She was already opening the door when she realised. He’d been calling her bluff, hadn’t he?
He marched into the apartment, clearly annoyed. He didn’t even greet her. “Why didn’t you wait for me? I was gone
ten minutes, Lois! I came straight back, like I promised!”
She avoided his gaze. “I had... things to do.” To get away from him, because his nearness was making her uncomfortable in ways she didn’t want to think about, she marched back into the kitchen.
He followed her. She swallowed, then put the island between them.
Clark glanced around the apartment, then focused on the cleaning materials which she’d left piled around the sink. “I see. Cleaning your grout was so important that you couldn’t wait for me?”
Anger blazed. “Well, you went off with Miss Pushy, didn’t you? You expected me to sit there on my own and wait for you like a Stepford wife, did you?”
He blinked. “I expected you to wait for me like my *friend* would! Because I’d asked you to!”
He was angry too. That made it harder. Of course, she could just tell him that he had no right to question her actions. No right at all to demand that she do
anything. But, apart from the fact that she really didn’t want to fight with Clark right now, he had a trump card if he chose to use it. All he had to do was remind her that she’d given him that right by what she’d said.
By the fact that she’d staked a claim on him, a claim he hadn’t denied.
Her hands twisted. This was awkward. “Okay. I know you think I should have waited. But I just didn’t want to, all right?”
He leaned against the counter dividing the kitchen from her living-room. “You were running away, Lois. Admit it.”
Indignation flared. “Of course I wasn’t!”
He rolled his eyes. “You and I both know you were.”
“Oh yeah? And, if you’re so clever, Kent, tell me why I was supposedly running away!”
She realised her mistake instantly. But it was too late.
“Because you told Linda I was taken.”
Bluff it out, Lois...
She grabbed her scraper and bent over the tiles again, trying to give the appearance of focusing her entire concentration on her task.
“Right. And you believed me? Come on, Clark! I just got fed up with her butting in all the time - ”
“I don’t think so.”
Her head shot up. He was watching her with that expression he
had to know drove her crazy. The one which said that he could see right through her. That he knew she was trying to put one over on him. And that he wasn’t fooled for one second.
Something had got into Clark tonight, though. He wouldn’t normally call her bluff so directly. He had to be very sure of his ground - and very sure that she wouldn’t tear him to pieces for it.
“What do you mean, you don’t think so?” Hands on hips, she glared at him.
He shook his head. “Oh, come on, Lois. You weren’t just bluffing her to get rid of her. You’ve hated the way she’s been flirting with me. You’re jealous, aren’t you?”
“No
way!” But she felt her face flushing.
Clark didn’t answer. But the way he was looking at her left her in no doubt of his thoughts. He didn’t believe her. And he wasn’t even pretending to.
He grinned, and it wasn’t friendly. It showed satisfaction, at her expense. “Well, Lois, if it makes you happy to believe that...”
She dropped her cleaning materials and stood upright, glaring at Clark. Anger warred with humiliation. Protesting wasn’t helping her any. For whatever reason, tonight he wasn’t in the mood to pretend to buy her excuses. The only thing she could do now to save herself further embarrassment was to throw him out. But, somehow, she didn’t want to do that. She had a weird sensation that their relationship was on some sort of precipice, and that if she made the wrong move it could change forever.
The trouble was, if she made the
right move it could change forever too.
And which move was right and which wrong?
Choking back anger, she took her courage in both hands and appealed to the better nature she, of all people, knew Clark possessed.
“Clark, don’t push me! I’m still trying to figure out why I said it myself!”
*********
The breath whooshed out of him.
He was pushing her. Deliberately. He’d come here with the express intention of getting the plan back on track. Of provoking a fight.
But, in the process, he was hurting her.
Why hadn’t it occurred to him that this would hurt her?
Maybe because they fought all the time. Fought, made up, fought again. It really was no big deal in their relationship. Underneath it all, they both knew that their friendship went deep enough that a few fights could never hurt it.
Except that he’d never deliberately set out to provoke her into a fight before. And this time - for the plan to work - he’d have to ensure that she stayed mad at him for days.
It had seemed so easy when he and Perry had talked it over. The small matter of creating a rift between Lois and himself which would last for... well, for as long as it took had seemed like a small price to pay. Nothing he couldn’t handle. Now, though, he loathed the thought of it.
“I’m sorry. You just took me by surprise, that’s all. I mean, I know she irritates you, but - unless us being together really is what you want, which I kind of doubt since you’ve done everything you can to warn me off ever since we met - wasn’t it a bit drastic?”
His softer tone seemed to soothe her a little. She sighed, then came around the island to stand closer to him. Her expression was conflicted. What was going through her head now? But, after a few moments, she seemed to come to a decision, though it wasn’t one which made her look happy. Resigned would be more appropriate, perhaps.
“I wasn’t going to tell you this. For one thing, it’s pretty darned humiliating for me, and it’s not something I like to remember, let alone talk about. But I guess maybe you need to know about Linda King and why I wouldn’t trust her as far as I could spit at her.”
He caught his breath. Lois never opened up about herself to anyone. Not if she could possibly avoid it. They’d been friends - best friends, she’d even admitted to him - for months now, and he still felt he knew way too little about her. Oh, she’d told him about Claude, but if she hadn’t thought she was about to die that was one secret he’d never have been privileged to know about. He’d practically had to drag out of her the reason her relationship with her father was so poor.
If she was about to open up to him again, this was serious. Linda King wasn’t just getting to Lois because of some trivial fight in the past, exacerbated by the fact that she was scooping the Planet and flirting with him. This went deep.
“Okay,” he said quietly. “I’m listening.”
“This doesn’t go beyond this room, right?” Her eyes flashed and strain was visible on her face.
He reached out and touched her arm. Just lightly, a brief caress which was over as soon as it had begun. “This is me, Lois. When have I ever betrayed anything you’ve told me in confidence?”
She bit her lip. “I guess.” And then, face averted, she began to talk. About a guy she’d admired - wanted - in college. The editor of the newspaper. And how she’d struggled to get his attention. About stumbling across a real scoop, a great story which was guaranteed to make him sit up and take an interest. And about a best friend who stole the story and wrote it under her own name, then proceeded to date the guy.
A best friend named Linda King.
Another stolen story. It was no wonder being scooped upset Lois so much. It was no wonder that she’d been so suspicious of him when he’d arrived at the Planet. And, in the circumstances, it was very surprising that she’d stolen his story back in their early days - though, he figured now, very out of character.
When he spoke, his voice was soft. Sympathetic. “So she stole a story and stole a guy, and now she’s doing it again?”
She whirled to face him. “Don’t flatter your - !” She broke off abruptly. “Yes.” The word sounded as if it was dragged from her.
Bile rose in his throat. He couldn’t possibly go through with the plan now. She’d already experienced too many acts of betrayal from people she’d trusted and cared about.
And she’d just admitted that what she’d said in the Press Club had been more than just an act to get rid of Linda.
“Lois.” He took a step closer to her. She didn’t move. She just watched him, her expression wary. Nervous. Like she expected to be hurt or humiliated.
“She’s not going to steal me away from you, Lois.”
...tbc
