Chapter 11: The Phone Calls Clark was stood outside a jewellery store when his phone rang very late the following day. He’d been considering each and every engagement ring on display, evaluating them one by one. He knew there were probably more inside, but that was a step too far at the moment, literally.
Looking at the caller ID he took a deep breath.
Well, here’s my chance to find out. “Hey, Lois. Feeling better now?” he asked cheerfully.
“Much. I’m so sorry I disappeared so quickly. It just happened so fast, and I couldn’t get in contact and I had to catch my plane.”
“Lois!” he butted in. “I understand. Truthfully, I am a little disappointed, but I still understand.” When everything went silent, Clark worried. “Lois?”
“Uh, sorry, Clark. I ...” she stuttered. “I didn’t want that to happen.”
“So, how was your first day at the summit?” Clark turned away from the sparkly window and began heading down the street.
“Pretty good actually. Looks like there’s controversy coming. Some European politicians have very different ideas and standards to the rest of the world. I could see it coming to blows.” Clark could hear the sing-song teasing tone she got when making a little joke.
“Really?” He decided to play along. “Maybe I should ask Perry if he wants an extra reporter there if it’s going to get so interesting.”
“Uh. No!” she stuttered back down the phone immediately. “I mean, I’ve got it covered. No need to fly you out too.”
“Lois?” Clark wrinkled his brow. “Are you trying to avoid me?” The moment he said the words he regretted them. If she was, then talking about it would probably bring about the end of the engagement, less than a day into it. But it was too late, the words were said and he just had to wait for her reply.
The phone line was silent for too many seconds but Clark continued to wait.
“I, um. I guess I am.” She spoke slowly and quietly. “I’m sorry,” she speeded up and then began to ramble at lightspeed. “It just took me by surprise. I didn’t expect it to happen like that and I’m not sure I’m ready. Not that I want to back out now that it’s done, I just need time to get my head round the idea. Is that okay?” She stopped and Clark could hear her heavy breathing.
“Of course it is, Lois. It
was a bit sudden.” He remembered her reaction to him mentioning a date for the wedding. “I won’t press you on any arrangements if that’s what you want.”
He heard her sigh of relief. “Thanks, Clark. You are so great. You did say you wanted to talk about some things and you needed to tell me something?”
“Well I was hoping to start making some wedding decisions, but we can leave them all for now. Except for two questions. I hope you don’t mind, Lois, but I do need to know something?” He waited.
“Okay, go ahead. What do you want to know,” she replied slowly.
“Would you like to tell people yet?” He knew the nervousness was showing in his voice.
“Ah,” she gulped. “Not yet, Clark,” she answered and he heard the inherent ‘sorry’ in her tone.
“I guess that also answers my other question then.”
“What question?”
“I wanted to know if you ... um ... would you like a ring?” he asked.
He heard her breath hitch on the other end of the phone and when she spoke he would swear he heard her voice cracking. “Not yet, Clark, but thank you for the thought.”
Clark looked back, over his shoulder, at the Jewellery store, regretfully, and then hung his head.
“It’s okay, Lois.”
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Lois tapped her foot and kept glancing at her watch.
Come on, come on. You should have finished an hour ago! She screamed at the delegate from Qatar but he didn’t hear her as it was all in her head. When he eventually stepped back from the podium and the press began standing and vacating the room she let out an audible “Finally!”
Slipping on her thin cotton jacket and picking up her bag she practically ran all the way back to her hotel room. Once inside the room she tossed away her bag and dropped to the floor scrambling under the bed.
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust but eventually a small shadow began to stand out from the rest of the shadows. “Yes. Come to mama!” she said as she shuffled further under to try and reach her phone.
It began to ring just as she was crawling backwards out from under the bed and the shock caused her to bang her head. “Ow.”
Finally climbing up and out she answered the phone, breathless. “Hi, Clark.”
“Hi, Lois,” came his voice straight into her ear. A shiver went down her spine as she remembered something ‘Dream Clark’ had whispered in her ear last night. “I’ve been phoning all afternoon, what happened?”
Phoning all afternoon! She grinned widely. Her heart, already thumping furiously, skipped a beat.
“I must have left the phone on the bed when we talked this morning and it slid off so when I turned to pack my bag and didn’t see it ... I’m so sorry. I’ve been frantic for the Summit to finish for the day so I could get back to find it.” She stopped to pant some more. “As you can tell from my heavy breathing.”
“I wondered what was causing that.” She could hear him chuckling.
“Hey, don’t you be getting the wrong idea, this is all aerobic workout.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Lois,” he replied and the flippant way he answered sent a little pain through her heart. But then there was silence and he didn’t say anything else and she heard some shuffling on the other end.
“So, what’s the urgency that had you ringing me all afternoon when I told you I’d phone this evening.”
“Actually it’s Perry that’s after you.”
“Oh!” she couldn’t hide her disappointment.
“He needs your okay on a few things he wants to change quite significantly in the article you sent yesterday.”
“Okay, I’ll call him now,” she said subdued. Suddenly all the life had drained out of her. “I’ll ring you tomorrow, okay?”
“Sure. I look forward to it Lois.”
After she hung up the phone Lois pondered over Clark’s final words.
Is he really looking forward to it? Or was it just a polite way to end the call? *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Clark was confused. To say that she wanted space and time to come to terms with the engagement Lois still rang him every day. They chatted for hours. When he thought about their conversations, though, he could find nothing in them to give him hope. It was ‘best friend’ talk; idle chatter about random things that had gone on during the day.
As he sat at home waiting for today’s call he seriously considered flying over and confronting her. But that would be unfair. He’d promised her time to come to terms with it, and he was willing to give it to her. And when it came time to reveal the truth he’d do it on home ground, somewhere she felt safe, somewhere familiar so that she didn’t feel threatened or ambushed.
When the phone finally rang he snatched up the receiver immediately.
“Lois?” he asked.
“Yeah, it’s Lois. Who else would it be?” she replied jokingly.
“Well, I was expecting a call from my hot, blonde girlfriend,” he immediately returned.
“Very funny, Clark. You used to run a mile whenever a hot blonde came on to you, even before we uh ... ” she stopped talking and Clark realised that she hadn’t meant to bring up the matter of the engagement yet so he quickly changed the subject.
“So, how’s it going then? One week of the conference over. Has anything erupted yet?”
“Nope, boring as ... well a Global Warming Summit.”
“Maybe I should come over to keep you company then.” A feature of every phone call was Clark managing to approach Lois with the idea of him coming over. After seven days, though, she now knew he was just teasing and that he was not the kind of man to push her when she wasn’t ready.
“I think the hotel is fully booked at the moment.” Another feature of the conversation was Lois coming up with a reason that he couldn’t come.
“Aw, that’s too bad.”
“So, what’s new in Metropolis?” she asked brightly.
“Oh,” Clark remembered, “Suzie, that you set me up with, and don’t deny it, she’s started seeing Terry in Sales.”
“Really?” Lois’ voice squealed in disbelief. “He’s not her type at all.”
“Yeah, you thought I was her type,” Clark accused gently.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
“Clark, thank goodness you’re in the office," came Lois' voice over the line the next day. "I’ve been trying to get through to Perry desperately.”
“He’s in an investor’s meeting. He’s been grouching about it all morning and when 1pm came around he stormed out of his office on the way to the conference room shouting ‘I don’t see why I even have to be there. I’m not an investor, just the Editor in Chief. The King never had to go to investors meetings. Great shades of Elvis.’”
Lois laughed delightedly. Clark did an absolutely superb Perry impression. “Well, I need to get a message to him about yesterday’s article. The Russian Delegate has recanted his statement on the carbon footprint of their Nuclear Power Stations and he’s announced radical new legislation that he is involved in implementing. Clark you should hear some of the ridiculous ideas he’s throwing around.”
“Okay, I’ll try and get a message to him.”
“Thanks, I gotta go. I just snuck out to call and I think I’m missing Australia now.”
“Okay, I’ll speak to you later then.”
“Yes, I’ll call you after everyth---,“ Lois had the wind knocked out of her suddenly and then a massive explosion rocked the building. The ground trembled beneath her feet and she stumbled to the floor. Looking up she screamed as a chunk of ceiling dropped from directly above aiming for her head.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Dare I ask for
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