[CHAPTER 21]
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Above all, let who you are, what you are, what you believe, shine through every sentence you write, every piece you finish. --John Jakes
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Friday
Escaping from yet another round of celebratory handshakes and small talk, Lois exited into the hallway and made her way toward the bathroom suites. An evening and a day spent alone in the midst of monuments and history had elevated her mood considerably. The Pulitzer Committee had timed the awards ceremony to coincide with the weekend of the Newseum’s – a new museum dedicated to news and journalism - Grand Opening. Arriving in town on Thursday had allowed her the opportunity to tour the new museum with few people around.
The words of the First Amendment were etched into the granite exterior wall next to the museum’s entrance. Running her hand along the definitive words had reminded Lois of the reason she had fallen in love with journalism in the first place. Those words were the reason she was here.
Lost in those thoughts, Lois didn’t notice the man standing at the bay window near the restrooms until he spoke.
“Lois?”
Blinking to attention, Lois turned away from the bathroom entrance. “Mr. Kent,” she said in surprise. “Hello.” She glanced around in silent question.
“Martha’s in the bathroom,” Jonathan replied with a shrug. Little wrinkles appeared around the older man’s eyes as he smiled at her. “Congratulations.”
Lois shrugged awkwardly. As much as she had heard them throughout the day, it was still hard to take the effusive compliments. “Thank you,” she said quietly.
That exchange seemed to exhaust their conversation. There was more that she wanted to say, but she had never really felt as if Clark’s father had ever approved of her. For all she knew, he shared Clark’s opinion that she had pushed her way into their lives unwarranted.
“Actually, I think I’m the one who should be thanking you,” Jonathan said.
“Me? What did I… I don’t understand.”
Jonathan looked away for a moment and Lois saw a number of emotions cross his face. This man was not one for large speeches but he said plenty without speaking.
“He’s not that hard to love,” she said softly, placing a hand on the man’s arm. “He’s an amazing little boy.”
“Lois? I was hoping we would get to see you!”
Smiling widely at the sound of Martha Kent’s voice, Lois turned to greet the woman who was coming out of the restroom and froze. She had expected the possibility of seeing Clark’s parents at the ceremony, but seeing the tuxedo-clad little boy cradled in Martha’s arms left her speechless.
<Hi Jory,> she signed, taking a small step toward them.
His eyes never leaving her, the child laid his head against his grandmother’s shoulder.
Martha rubbed his back and continued to walk over to where Lois and Jonathan were standing. “You’ll have to understand he’s been a little withdrawn lately…” Martha’s words trailed off as if she were waiting for Lois to step in with an explanation.
Lois frowned. It didn’t seem as if Clark had told his parents about what had happened between them two weeks before. She looked at Martha sadly. “I haven’t been able to come and see him…” she offered evasively.
Stepping close enough so that she could stroke Jory’s hair, Lois tried signing to him again. <Hi baby.>
Jory straightened and frowned at her. <Me bad?>
Lois’s eyes widened and she shot a glance at Martha in shared confusion. <No. Never.>
<Why you leave me?>
Steeling herself against the surge of emotion that accosted her, Lois made a fist and rubbed it in a circle over her chest. <Sorry. Very, very sorry.>
Jory watched her hands for a brief moment before reaching out to be held. Lois gathered him into her arms without a thought to the potential wrinkles the action would bring to her evening gown.
“How is everything going?” Lois asked, attempting to sound light and unworried.
“Well, there has been…”
“Dad, can you and Mom take Jory back into the ballroom please? They are getting ready to begin.”
Lois looked up to see Clark standing a little distance away with a steely expression on his face.
“But Clark…” Martha began.
“Please, Mom,” he interrupted. “I would like to speak to Lois for a moment.”
After noticing a concerned look flash across Jonathan’s face, Lois tilted her head warily and gently lowered Jory so he could stand on the floor. Martha took his hand and he waved happily as the two adults escorted him down the hall.
“I would appreciate it if you would keep your distance from him tonight. He was finally starting to make some progress,” Clark said evenly.
Pushing her hair behind her ear, Lois scoffed. “Why would you bring him here if you didn’t want to chance our running into each other? I hadn’t even expected it.”
Clark’s eyes narrowed imperceptibly. “Both of my parents wanted to be here tonight and I didn’t feel comfortable just leaving him with anyone.” After a brief pause in which neither of them spoke, he turned to leave. “I’ll do my part in making sure there are no more run-ins.”
At the sight of his back, Lois felt suddenly disoriented. “Sometimes I think that you are deliberately out to hurt me,” she said as he walked away. “And then sometimes I think you’re out to hurt yourself.”
Clark’s steps halted but he didn’t turn around.
Encouraged, Lois continued speaking, “It’s like you want to tear down any redeemable quality you have so that people will treat you the way you think you deserve to be treated.” She took a tiny step toward him. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking – as you can probably imagine – and a lot of reflection. In fact, I was remembering what you said... what your exact words were.”
Another inch forward.
“You said that you had no *intention* of falling in love with me. At the time the semantics didn’t register. Intention infers deliberation – a purpose and a plan. It says nothing about something that has already happened.”
One more step.
“I had no *intention* of falling in love with you either, Clark,” she said to his back. “It doesn’t change the fact that I did though. And I think that it’s the same for you. So I guess that it really wasn’t what you said – it was what you didn’t say…”
At this point the distance between them was only a few steps but Lois didn’t move to close it. He still wasn’t facing her, or making any move to do so.
“I think you got scared… Clark, turn around.” She was getting agitated by his non-response. “Turn around and tell me one way or the other. Do you love me?”
As the silence expanded from a few seconds to thirty, Lois began to get anxious. Unable to guess the meaning of the tense standoff, she pushed again, “*Are* you in love with me?”
“This is beneath you, Lois. It really is. I’m asking you nicely to leave my family alone.” With that, he walked away without sparing her a glance.
Lois angrily set her jaw when she felt a tear catch in the corner of her eye. She was not going to cry. She was not going to ruin her mascara over something like this.
When blinking caused the tear to dislodge from its precarious position, she turned and stalked to the door of the restroom resolving that she was just going to have to fix her makeup.
He hadn’t even turned around.
~.~
Sam Lane watched curiously as a waiter carried a drink tray out of the ballroom’s doors and into the hallway. His attention refocused as his wife returned to his side. “Find her?”
Ellen shook her head. “There are a *lot* of people here,” she explained, still peering into the crowd.
The rest of the Lane family had arrived a little late to the ceremony and hadn’t yet been able to locate Lois. Once he and Ellen had picked Lucy up from the airport, they had gone to the hotel to change clothes. Even after living with them for years, he did not know why it took women so long to get ready.
Once the emcee had announced a slight intermission before starting the next round of awards, they had begun to search the crowd for any signs of Lois while the lights were up.
“Nothing,” Lucy informed them, arriving from the crowd at their back. She looked worried for a moment. “This is the right place, isn’t it?”
Sam frowned as the sight of something odd was revealed to him by the shifting crowd. “I would say yes unequivocally, but then again, I’d never expect to see a toddler at a 4 hour long banquet.”
“What are you talking about?” Ellen asked, straining her neck to see what he was looking at. Her confused expression suddenly cleared and she squinted for a better look. “That’s Jory! Those must be Clark’s parents. Come on.”
Sam and Lucy dutifully followed as Ellen approached the two people flanking the young boy. When Jory noticed them, his hands waved in a communiqué that Sam didn’t understand. The sound of Ellen’s laughter informed him that she, on the other hand, did catch it.
“Hello to you too,” Ellen said to him, leaning down to reciprocate the hug.
Sam patted the boy’s head and turned to shake the hand of the other man. “Samuel Lane,” he said. “This is my wife Ellen and our daughter Lucy. We’re friends of your grandson’s,” he joked.
“Jonathan Kent,” the other man replied with a twinkle in his eye. “And this is my wife Martha. Any friend of Jory’s is a friend of ours.”
Ellen and Lucy both reached out for handshakes in greeting as Sam moved around them to greet Martha. He ended up having to shake Jory’s hand twice, as the little boy felt the need to get in on the ritual.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Martha offered. “Lois and I once had lunch at your hospital.”
“Well it would be nice if we could find her,” Lucy piped. “I’ve been trying to scope her out in the midst of all these people and I don’t even know what color her dress is.”
Jonathan frowned in surprise. “We saw her about an hour ago near the restrooms. She was wearing a deep burgundy gown. I’m surprised you haven’t seen her…”
“Jonathan and I left her speaking with Clark,” Martha added.
Sam caught the look that Ellen gave him and reciprocated it.
“Is something wrong?” Martha asked. Apparently she had seen the look as well.
“Is he still with her?” Ellen asked.
Martha shook her head. “No, he’s been with us for quite a while. He just went to get us some drinks.”
“By the bathrooms, right?” Lucy asked as she readied to leave.
Sam stopped her by placing a hand on her shoulder. He looked at his wife again. “I’ll go.”
Ellen nodded and released a light sigh. “Okay.”
Sam turned away from four sets of worried eyes and made his way toward the ballroom exit. When he arrived at the door to the women’s bathroom, he hesitated briefly before walking inside.
As expected, he found Lois sitting in one of the plush chairs that decorated the small lounge area that separated the outside door from the bathroom proper. She was nursing a glass of amber liquid.
“Whatca doin’, Lane?” he asked gruffly.
He almost laughed at the startled look on her face when she raised her head. It reminded him of the time he had caught her testing cocktail mixes at his home bar when she was 18.
“Daddy! This is the *Ladies* room,” she whispered vehemently.
Sam moved to sit on the adjacent chair and shifted it so he could see her clearly. “Correction, this is the ladies *lounge*. I don’t think I will offend any female sensibilities by being in the equivalent of a living room.” He gestured to the two doors bracketing the room. They were cut off from the actual location of stalls and sinks.
As if to emphasize his statement, the door leading to the bathroom opened and two women stepped through. They only hesitated slightly at the sight of a man in the lounge before continuing through the door to the hall.
“See,” he said, shrugging. “No big deal to see a dude in a pink chaise. You know in Europe even the bivvies are co-ed.” He reached across and took the glass from his daughter, taking a long drink before setting it down on the table next to him. “So, are you in here toasting yourself, or attempting to get toasted?”
Lois closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the cushions. “I’m desensitizing.”
Sam nodded. Given the way she had been sipping her drink, he was not concerned for her sobriety. “I don’t know if I tell you this enough, Kiddo, but I am extremely proud of you. Extremely proud.”
She waved a hand dismissively in the air. “It’s just an award, Dad.”
Sam reached over and captured her hand, holding it until she opened her eyes to look at him. “Maybe so,” he said, “but I’m not talking about the Pulitzer, even though I’m proud of that too. What I meant was I am proud of you for the woman you are. The one you are when you’re chasing justice, and the one you are when you are when you’re not. *You*, Lois Lane, are my daughter and I need nothing more than that as a reason.”
Lois’s brow wrinkled and she quickly looked away. “Daddy…”
“You were always so driven when you were little,” Sam continued, ignoring her impending protest. “If there was something that you wanted, you would somehow find a way to get it. Like a Terrier on a pant leg, you wouldn’t stop holding on until the outcome was the way you wanted it to be. It scared me.”
That caused her to look at him in confusion and he chuckled. “It scared me to think that there would be a day when you would want something and go after it, only to find that it’s not yours to have.”
Her expression flattened and he felt bad for having caused it, but knew he needed to finish. “There is *nothing* wrong loving someone. In fact, it is the most courageous and selfless thing you can do. It doesn’t detract from your character; it builds on it and extends it. Having the capacity to truly open yourself to another person’s soul shows strength and compassion, and you have amazed me with that capacity.”
Moving from his chair, Sam squatted in front of her and moved his head so that she was forced to meet his gaze. This beautiful woman in the elegant and sleek dress was just his little girl.
“Lois, sometimes having the drive and the passion is not enough. You can’t love him enough to make up from him not loving you.” He noticed a flicker of doubt cross her face and readied himself for a denial or a rebuttal. It didn’t come, and her expression shifted into one of determined resignation.
“I know,” she finally said after a full minute of silence. “Thanks Daddy.”
Finding no trace of hesitance or sadness in her gaze, Sam nodded. “Any time.” He rose to his feet and offered her his hand. “Now come on. They’re getting ready to announce your award.”
~.~
Clark saw Lois and her father enter the darkened ballroom from the door on the other side of the stage and felt an unexpected surge of relief. The presentation of the award for Investigative Journalism was next and he had feared having to accept it alone. If there was anything he didn’t like more than feeling vulnerable, it was being put on the spot.
…And then there was just the fact that the sight of her always brought with it a sense of calm.
“And now, for the final presentation of the evening, the award for investigative reporting is awarded to the Daily Planet for the paper’s article series on the fall of Cyphren Chemical Corporation which in turn spurred EPA reform efforts. Accepting the award are the authors of the series, the Daily Planet’s star reporting team of Lois Lane and Clark Kent.”
Clark rose from his seat on the front row and met Lois’s eyes as the applause began. She gave him a curt nod and moved toward the stage after kissing her father on the cheek. Straightening his tie, Clark sighed and moved toward stairway to the stage that was closest to him.
They ended up approaching the presenter from opposite ends of the stage and meeting in the middle. Clark shook the man’s hand and accepted the navy leather folder with golden image of the Pulitzer medal embossed on its cover. A blown-up image of one of their photo shoot images appeared on the screen behind the podium. Even though it had been staged, it looked incredibly natural. In the photo, Clark was seated behind a desk typing at a computer while Lois leaned over his shoulder pointing at something on the screen.
Clark flicked a glance at Lois and thought he might have imagined the slight tightening around her eyes. He gestured to the podium and muttered, “After you.”
“Of course,” she said flatly before turning from the photo and grinning brightly at the audience. “Thank you,” she started, signaling to the audience to stop clapping. “Wow, this is great… I mean I knew we’d won before I climbed the stairs to the stage, so I should have been expecting this, but when you’re up here, it’s…” She turned slightly to indicate the elaborate setup with a wave of her arm. Smiling widely and shaking her head, she turned back to the podium and leaned forward as if telling the crowd a secret. “…It’s a dream come true.”
The audience began clapping again, and she lifted a hand. “There are a few people I would like to mention, because without them this story would never have been written, and change never would have been accomplished. First, thanks to Perry White, Franklin Stern, and everyone at the Daily Planet, for producing a newspaper with integrity and commitment to the truth. I also want to thank those people whose assistance in gathering the various facts in this story was invaluable.”
She arched an eyebrow and tilted her head while studying the audience. “I don’t give out my sources,” she warned, earning laughter from the audience, “but they know who they are and know that this award is as much theirs as it is mine. Finally, thanks goes to Dr. Wallace Kwolek, who’s decision to come forward as David against a Goliath named Cyphren reminds us all that *each* of us has the opportunity, and even the responsibility, to step up and not sit quietly by as injustice takes place.”
As the applause began again, Clark saw that Lois started to take a step back but hesitated. Her head turned slightly and she looked up at the picture again. Narrowing his eyes, Clark wondered what she about to do.
Stepping forward again, Lois cleared her throat. “Sorry. I’ll be brief but there’s something else I need to say.” She swallowed and then her posture straightened, as if she had reached inside herself to gather strength. “Yesterday I toured the Newseum that just opened on Pennsylvania Avenue. It’s really spectacular and I encourage everyone to go if you have the chance. Um… I was walking through the Pulitzer wing – wow, it just hit me that I’m going to be in there too – anyway, they have this 20 foot display of every picture that has won the award for photojournalism in the last four decades. One of them has served as a touchstone for me throughout my career, and thinking about it at this moment… it’s serving as a touchstone again.”
Clark glanced out at the audience. Instead of being annoyed that Lois was giving a longer than normal speech, they seemed to be drawn in by her sudden candor.
“I once told someone that my guiding principles were truth and justice,” she continued. “It is because of the first of those words that I, um, feel the need to say this.” She pointed to the screen behind her. “That picture up there does not represent the truth. Yes, we once were a team – or some semblance of one – but as much as my employer would like to sell the idea of our congruency and permanence, there is no team, no partnership.” She turned her head slightly so that her eyes met Clark’s while her mouth remained next to the microphone. “There is no us.”
With that, she gathered her award from the podium and walked off the stage, leaving the audience unsure of how to respond. When Clark stepped forward, everyone looked to him for a redirect.
Uncomfortable with the stares, he leaned down to the mic and said, “Thank you.” Then he nodded and exited the stage the way he had come.
~.~
Lucy met Lois at the bottom of the stairs to the stage. “See, that’s kind of what I meant by not doing something rash…”
Lois shoved the award folder into her sister’s hands as she walked by. “You said deal with it. I’m dealing.”
Lucy rushed to catch up to her. “I wanted you to deal with it *after* we talked face-to-face!”
“That’s not what you said,” Lois pointed out.
“Lois…”
“Excuse me, Darlin’,” Perry interrupted, stepping up and tucking Lois’s hand around his elbow. “I need to have a word with your sister.”
Lucy nodded and after giving Lois a look, she held up the folder and said, “I’ll go show this to Mom and Dad.”
Perry led her to the ballroom doors and into the hall without saying a word during as they walked.
Once outside, Lois pulled her hand from his grasp. “Perry…”
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “Whatever *that* was up there, I don’t think I’m ready to hear an explanation for. Call me crazy but I also don’t think you’re in the right mindset to even try.
Lois closed her eyes and groaned. It was all beginning to resonate. Had she really just done that while on stage at the *Pulitzer* awards ceremony? Lois Lane didn’t crack – especially not in public.
Perry made an affirmative sound. “Just as I thought. Now, I’m going to go in there and see what repair I can do with the suits seeing as you just knocked down a whole slew of promotional dollars with one swing. I know your first instinct is going to be to hightail it out of this hotel as if the devil himself were behind you, but I’m going to challenge you not to do that. I want you to stay out here long enough to get yourself together, and then you come back in and make the rounds, give the interviews, and pose for pictures with the grace and the composure you are normally known for. If you don’t make a big deal about it, neither will they. Got me?”
Lois opened her eyes. “Yes, sir,” she replied contritely.
Perry nodded. “Good. That’s good.” He paused for a moment then rubbed her arm affectionately. “No more announcements tonight, okay?” Then he turned and disappeared back inside the ballroom.
Lois lifted her eyes to the ceiling and took a deep breath. Her thoughts were spiraling, but she knew she couldn’t allow that to get in the way of doing her job. There was a time when emotion made for a better story… right now that wasn’t the case.
With a sigh, she realized that her dad had been right. Perry had been right. Lucy had been right.
She wasn’t ‘dealing’ with it. All of the self-revelations and reflections she’d engaged in over the past week hadn’t really equated to ‘progress’.
No, the healing would begin when she finally started to let go of that which was not going to be.
There certainly *were* deeper levels of hurting like a bitch.
~.~
tbc
