Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic FDK: Don't Leave Me

A poignant reminder of why Clark was such a jerk. He left Lois feeling as if a donut was more important than his relationship with her.


Elisabeth

Beautifully written.

Perfect.

Love that way of putting it.

Agonizingly beautiful.

I guess you could say I spent years waiting for Clark/Superman to realize that Lois was his person. So thank you, Sarah, för putting it so beautifully.

I guess that is what Smallville and all those other Superman productions where Lois is a background character do to me: they leave me wondering if Lois will ever be able to catch up. And I don't think she will.

It's like watching a man who is much too attractive to have just one woman: you read about a rather small part of his life, which he devoted to one particular woman, before it was time for him to move on. And you wonder if he will ever let this particular woman be *his* woman. No, you wonder if he will ever let her be his *person*. And you know, deep down in your heart, that he won't. Because there is always the next Smallville and the next Lana Lang waiting round the corner.

Heartbreakingly beautiful.

Ann

This is an issue that the show never fully addressed. I don't think Clark ever fully realised what he was putting Lois through when he ran off on her. He was so focused on how angry she would be when she found out that he didn't focus on how hurt she was by not knowing. He was so worried about his own insecurities (I needed to know that you would marry *me*) that he didn't think enough about hers. (I need you to trust me with all of you, not insist that I love the part you chose to show me.)

One of the best things about Lois and Clark's relationship as it matures is that in includes real forgiveness. They both hurt each other in real and important ways and they both forgive each other. Neither of them is perfect, but neither requires the other one to be perfect. You've captured how Lois knows that Clark is deceiving her but forgives him even *before* he's come clean. That's what Clark hasn't realized yet; that he *can* confess because he *will* be forgiven.

I'd love to see a part two of this; for Clark to find out how Lois feels and realize what a jerk he's being.

As I was reading this, I kept having flashbacks to S2 and all the times he runs away just when she needed to talk.

I’m constantly struck by the disconnect between how strongly he’s attracted to Lois and his willingness to leave her hanging repeatedly.

The reality is that she was far more forgiving that he deserved. That is how I feel when I think of this phase of their relationship and it’s exactly what came to mind as I read this.

Very nice!

Bob

Exactly, Bob. But why did he keep acting like that?

As a long-time Superman fan, I think that the answer is that the show worked with an old comic book concept, and they were going to keep much of their icon's behaviour - particularly his constant running away from Lois - but at the same time, they decided to change the hero's fundamental motivations. In the old comic book, Superman was the real person and Clark Kent was the disguise. More precisely, Clark Kent was Superman's time out. Clark Kent was Superman's chance to relax and walk around as an ordinary person. This meant, of course, that Clark Kent had no life of his own, no interests of his own and not really any friends - I mean, Clark's friendship with Jimmy wasn't something you could take very seriously. It wasn't as if Clark Kent was hanging out with Jimmy or going to football matches with him or anything like that.

Because Clark was such an empty shell, it was of course not possible for him to have a relationship with Lois. Yes, sometimes he told himself that it would be so nice if Lois would love him as Clark Kent, because then he could marry her. But seriously, what was there for Lois to love about old comic book Clark?

On the other hand, it was impossible for Superman to marry Lois. I think we can all understand why. Lois would have been in far too much danger if she was known to the world to be Superman's wife, and all kinds of criminals and terrorists could use Lois to blackmail Superman, if they knew that he was married to her.

Because Superman knew that he couldn't marry Lois as his super self, he knew he would have to try to shape up as Clark Kent if he really wanted a relationship with Lois. But he never did, because, bottom line, he wasn't interested in her. The gratification he could receive from being with her couldn't make up for the bother she would cause him.

So Superman didn't want Lois, even though he was somewhat attracted to her. That is why the movie Superman II hurt me so terribly, because it threw his past behaviour toward Lois in such painfully sharp relief. It was quite possible to consider Superman's behaviour in that movie as him scratching an itch regarding Lois - he did get to make love to her after all - only to take away her memory of both their lovemaking and his secret identity and put everything back to status quo. Yes, Superman did want Lois physically. And no, he didn't want *her*. And no, he didn't want her to know anything about himself.

Before Superman scratched his itch regarding Lois in Superman II, he had spent years diligently deflecting her advances towards him. Old comic book Lois strongly suspected that Clark Kent was Superman, because unlike Lois in STNAOS she wasn't galactically stupid. Old comic book Lois thought that she could perhaps force Superman to love her if she managed to reveal his secret. (Yeah... that was galactially stupid.)

So anyway, in the old comic books the interaction between Lois and Clark boiled down to two basic concepts. One, Lois and Clark are on a job together, or are talking together, and Clark has to be Superman, so he runs away from her. (He makes some truly pathetic excuses, like he has a stomachache and has to go to the bathroom, and Lois is left fuming.) Or, two, Lois has come up with a clever idea to prove that Clark is Superman, and Clark has to use his superpowers as ingeniously as possible to thwart her scheme. The last kind of story was always fun to read, because Clark was always very clever in them, and it was fun to see what new ideas he would come up with to save his secret. But those stories were depressing to read, too. It was like watching a strong boy using his strength to defeat a weak girl. There was no way she could win, and I couldn't help feeling that Clark was unfair to Lois in them.

Okay. Here is the problem. In the old comic books Clark always ran away from Lois because he needed to be Superman, and he never told Lois why he ran away because he just didn't want a relationship with her. In the show, however, they decided that Clark would still run away from Lois all the time and he would still not tell her why... but he nevertheless wants a relationship with her? He really, really wants her?

If you ask me, this doesn't make sense. If Clark doesn't want Lois, then he runs away from her and generally pushes her away and refuses to tell her about himself. That makes sense. But if he truly does want her, the he shouldn't do these things to her, should he? It doesn't make sense.

Ann

It does if you add in his insecurities regarding Lois, cultivated during the first season and the Luthor fiasco.

Firstly, he's afraid how she'll react--if she's really angry, he could lose even his friendship with her, which is very important to him even without the feelings he has for her.

Second, he's never told anyone, so he's not sure how to go about it.

And third, their jobs/lives are so busy that he's been having trouble even making the time to tell her properly--"Lois, I'm Superman" isn't something that is appropriate to be blurted out as you're flying off to a rescue, after all (and Jimmy/Perry interruptus doesn't help either).

This isn't to say that he's not hurting Lois--on the contrary, I know she's very hurt. But there are two sides to the issue, and Clark's feelings shouldn't be dismissed as unimportant or not as worthy of consideration as Lois's.

And then, if you get into meta-fandom (using a gaming term--a la meta-gaming--to describe this, since I don't know if there's an appropriate fandom term), you could just say, "The writers of the show weren't allowed to have Lois know yet, so they made Clark give all those excuses and it added some pretty good conflict to the plotlines anyway."