Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic What If...? 3a/4

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Season 3: What If...She Stayed?
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“I’m sorry…do I know you?”

In this moment, he wishes that he weren’t invulnerable. He wishes he’d never been invulnerable. Surely if he’d been able to hurt, to really experience pain, on a routine basis, he’d have developed some tolerance for it. Some baseline of immunity so that instead of feeling everything, he’d feel only the peaks that spike over that plateau (which would already, he knows, be too much to bear).

He was prepared for Wanda, ready to play a part and ease her back into Lois, but this…this is nothing.

This is a blank.

(At least she won’t love Luthor, he thinks, and hates himself for it.)

“I’m Clark,” he says. Some idealistic, hopeful, stupid part of himself perks up and waits, for his name to resonate through her battered skull. For her eyes to spark and her mouth to curve and her hands to reach out.

“Clark.” She tilts her head slightly as she shapes her mouth around the word (his heart leaps to his throat). Then she gives the impression of a shrug. “Hmm.”

Hmm. Everything between them, all their history, the ‘Will you marry mes’ and the ‘Who’s askings’--all of it boiled down to this.

To a hum of acknowledgement.

Clark hurts. He hurts and hurts and hurts and he does not think, as he watches her disappear down a hallway (looking back at him, and he longs for that to mean something even as he knows, realistically, it’s likely because he’s the only non-medical person to talk to her), he really does not think that he will ever stop hurting.

(And he has no one to blame but himself.)

***

The papers are all laid out before him. Apparently, he’s able to make medical decisions for Lois. As her fiancé. Not as her husband (which is what he should be, what he’s supposed to be). But as the man her mother endorsed (not on the walk down the aisle or with the lighting of any candles, just medically and financially).

The facility on the brochure looks great. Clean and beautiful, full of smiling people and qualified doctors. But Clark is stuck on one phrase: as long as needed.

How long is that? How long would Lois be living in that place (alone), vulnerable and afraid and lost? How many days (weeks, months, years) will he be separated from her?

They’re qualified. This Dr. Deter is the renowned expert.

But the patients are all elderly. Lois (his Lois) won’t be able to follow her instincts, won’t be free to snoop and investigate and get into trouble, around them. The doctors may know more about memory loss, but not about Lois. He knows Lois. Perry knows her, and Jimmy, and her friends at the Planet, Star and his parents.

Clark’s stomach tightens uncomfortably (with guilt?), but he lays the pen aside.

“No,” he says. “No, I’m going to take her home with me.”

***

“Oh,” she says when she sees him hovering in the doorway of her hospital room. “Are you here for me?”

The pain of that question strikes deep (because he hadn’t been there for her, he was too caught up in his own selfish joy to listen to her when she warned him something was going to happen on their wedding day).

For her sake, he smiles. “Yes,” he says. “I am. You want to get out of here?”

She perks up immediately. “I get to leave?”

“Yeah. I don’t think this place is going to be any good for bringing back your memories.”

“Definitely not good for my sanity,” she says dryly as she stands and pats herself down, as if to make sure she’s got everything. She’s wearing jeans and a t-shirt, and grabs a jacket, all things he brought for her from the suitcase in his apartment (the suitcase the clone had shoved aside in favor of a mountain of shopping bags he cleared out and donated to homeless shelters in his haste to pretend he hadn’t let an imposter into his bed).

“So,” he says past the omnipresent tightness in his throat. “You want to see what your life looks like?”

She grins at him. A real, unabashed grin, and if it has none of the fondness he’s so used to seeing soften the edges of it, it’s still beautiful (and it’s still directed at him). “Definitely. Lead the way, Clark.”

He almost does before something makes him stop. He turns back to her and gestures her ahead of him. “Actually,” he says softly, “usually, you lead. You are the senior partner, after all.”

“Really?” Her glee is almost childlike and Clark actually chuckles.

“Not really,” he admits, “but you definitely usually walk faster.”

She laughs, and precedes him out of the hospital.

***

The Daily Planet hasn’t changed at all. It’s the same as it was when he left everything clean and shut down, all ready and eager for his wedding. It’s the same as when he came back a mere two days later with a strange sense of foreboding and terror and uneasiness, a copy of Lois at his side. It’s the same as when he realized he wasn’t married, after all, that his dreams had turned into nightmares and his fiancée (not his wife, because they never got that far) was missing, when he stormed out after the clone made him look like an abusive husband (neither of which he was, not abusive and not the husband he longs to be).

It’s the same, but there’s something completely different about seeing it through Lois’s eyes.

“So my name is Lois Lane,” she says as he follows her through the revolving door, “and I’m a reporter.”

“The best reporter,” he says, and for the first time sees a flash of hesitance in her eyes.

“Well, I was,” she mutters. “Who knows what I am now?”

“Hey.” Clark touches her elbow, just lightly enough to make her stop walking and look at him. “You’re the most brilliant person I’ve ever known, Lois, and you don’t need memories to have good instincts. It may take you a while to get up to speed, but I’d follow your hunches anywhere.”

She blinks up at him, touched and wondering. “Oh,” she says faintly. “Well, that’s…good to know.” Then she pulls back a step and summons up a smile. “What if my hunch says not to trust you?”

He can’t help it. He sucks in his breath sharply, the recipient of yet another blast of pain he’s nowhere near prepared for. His joints ache, his bones thrum, his skin is raw and taut, aftereffects of whatever Luthor shot him with repeatedly, but that’s nothing at all compared to the fact that he should have been there for her. He should have known when she was taken from the church. He should have realized the clone wasn’t her. He should have admitted sooner what he’d subconsciously known. He should have scoured the city by day and night and taken her from Luthor’s clutches without letting his own hurt cloud his judgment. He should have…he should have done so much to save her.

And instead he did nothing.

She trusted him, and he failed her (repeatedly).

“Clark? Clark, I’m sorry. I was just joking, really. I guess my sense of humor must not be the greatest, huh?”

Clark wants to kick himself as soon as he blinks away his regrets to see Lois peering up at him worriedly, her hand resting on his arm. Once again, he’s focusing more on his own feelings than on what she needs.

(Maybe it’s best they’re not married; maybe he’s really not ready to live up to the responsibility of being a husband.)

“No, I’m sorry,” he says quickly. He tries to smile, but it doesn’t seem to reassure her despite the way she takes a step back. “Your sense of humor is fine. Great, even. Shall we go up to the bullpen? That’s where your desk is. Jimmy--he’s our friend--he can get you all the stories you’ve written, give you kind of a crash course in what you do.”

“Sure.” She watches him closely as he guides her to the elevators. It’s not until they’ve entered and are alone, the floors zipping past them, that she says, “So…I trust you, right? I mean, that’s why you were so hurt by what I said?”

It’s so hard to smile now even though he knows it shouldn’t be. Lois is here and safe, no matter that she doesn’t remember him. “Yeah,” he admits, because he doesn’t want to lie to her. “But I know you don’t really know me anymore. I’m not expecting you to just trust me automatically.”

“Oh.” She stares at the elevator doors. Just before they open, she says, almost firmly, “But I do. I think. I mean, you’ve been here for me the whole time. I definitely don’t distrust you.”

“Good to know,” he says, his heart just a bit lighter. As the doors open, he leans in just a bit closer to renew his promise (not a vow, but it feels like one all the same), “And you can trust me, Lois. I would never hurt you. And I won’t lie to you.”

True to her word, she nods (she chooses to trust him).

And Clark is suddenly afraid, because not lying to her…well, that’s never been his strong suit.

***

Perry tries to be friendly, but the strain shows through. Jimmy is open and eager and more than willing to compile disks of all her work (“BCK and ACK,” Clark hears him say. “Before Clark Kent and After Clark Kent.”). Several others come up and talk to her, and Lois holds her own with all of them, up front about her memory loss but in a teasing way that seems to set most everyone at ease. Clark tries not to hover, tries to stay at his own desk while she familiarizes herself with her own space.

“Clark, son,” Perry says, leaning over to talk to him. “Why did you bring her here first? Don’t you think she should be resting or something? She just went through some severe trauma.”

“The doctors say she’s fine aside from the memory loss,” Clark says, not able to tear his eyes off her as she dumps her cold coffee into the pot on the corner of her desk. “And she doesn’t remember the trauma, Perry. Besides, you really think Lois Lane wants to be resting?”

Perry studies him, his eyes shrewd, seeing more than Clark is entirely comfortable with. “You didn’t take her to your place yet at all, did you?”

Clark is silent.

“And you haven’t told her she doesn’t have her own apartment anymore.” Perry tips his head closer to really hammer in his next point. “And when, exactly, are you planning on telling her that you two are more than just work partners?”

“I’m not going to hit her with everything all at once,” Clark says, calmly. Logically. (Not, above all, giving away how much that Clark…hmm still hurts him.) “And this is what she’ll remember first, Chief. She loves being a journalist, investigating, uncovering hidden truths. More than anything, this is what will bring her back.”

Perry’s hand falls on his shoulder, a grip that Clark knows in his head is reassuring and companionable. But right now it just feels heavy, like another burden added to the rest already piled up there (Perry needs Lois back, too, he loves her, and Clark can’t mess this up for him, or Jimmy, or her parents, or even Metropolis).

“She loves you, too, son,” Perry says. “Don’t forget that.”

He can’t.

(But she already has.)

***

“So do we ever get to eat or do I live off of secrets and newspaper ink?”

Clark looks up from the screen he can’t focus on to see Lois actually approaching him, seemingly without any hesitance at all.

“Yeah,” he says with a smile. “We eat. I didn’t want to interrupt you when you looked so engrossed.”

“We write a lot of stories,” she says contemplatively. “And if I didn’t know any better, I’d think we worked for a tabloid. I mean, cyborgs and evil villains and voodoo--not to mention the biggest one of all. Superman. He’s an alien?”

His heart compresses into a tight ball of leaden nerves.

“Does that bother you?” he asks (he’s not sure he wants to know the answer).

“No, not really.” She shrugs and presses the button for the elevator as she pulls her jacket back on. “It’s just strange. Takes a while to get used to. We seem to write a lot of stories about him.”

“Well,” he says slowly, giving himself time to find a truthful way of answering, “Superman does his best to help a lot, like you do, so it makes sense you’d run into him often.”

“You used to get more quotes from him than I did,” she observes with a sidelong glance.

Clark’s laugh is real. He’s just so happy that she’s being suspicious and nosy, so relieved that she doesn’t seem afraid to talk to him. “Exactly how many of your old stories did you read today?”

She seems pleased. “A lot. Though, to be perfectly honest, I skimmed a lot of them. I was looking more for generalities than specifics.”

Clark is caught by the way the lights of the lobby reflect off the spark in her eyes (by the inch or two closer she’s walking to him than this morning). “I told you it wouldn’t take you long to pick everything up,” he says, and doesn’t fail to notice that her cheeks flush pink.

***

Not wanting to overwhelm her, Clark doesn’t fly anywhere to pick up dinner. Instead, he gives her the keys to her Jeep (she actually does a tiny excited hop when she realizes he’s letting her drive) and directs her to their favorite takeout restaurant.

“So where do I live?” she asks when they’ve got the food and are back in the Jeep.

And this is it, the moment he’s been both anticipating and dreading in pretty equal amounts.

“For now, you’re staying at 344 Clinton Street,” he says. He doesn’t comment when she makes the first turn without even asking him for directions. Maybe, he cautions his foolish heart, she spent some of her time this afternoon memorizing a map of Metropolis.

“Hey,” she says after a moment of silence (she still hasn’t asked directions). “I wanted to say thank you.”

“For what?” He tightens his hands into fists as she automatically takes the left onto his street.

“For staying with me.” She chances a look over at him. “I mean, I know we’re partners, and I’m guessing that we’re friends--probably even best friends, if the way you know my favorite food and where I keep my White-Out and have the keys to my Jeep is any indication--but still, all of this is above and beyond the call of duty.”

“It’s really not,” he says, and can’t help the almost regretful tone to his voice. “I mean, of course I’ll help you, Lois, I’d always help you, but…it’s more than that.”

She swerves into her usual parking spot with her usual lack of attention to the brakes or turn signals, and turns to face him. “What does that mean?”

“Lois…” He plays with the handle of the plastic bag holding their dinner. “There’s something I need to tell you. I’ve been trying to find a way to say it all day, but…I don’t know. I couldn’t find the right words or the right moment, but--”

“We’re dating.”

He stares at her. “What?”

She actually laughs at him. “I mean, come on, Clark, we work together all the time, we obviously eat dinner together, you’re the one who was at the hospital for me, and…well, frankly, the way you look at me doesn’t leave a lot of room for misinterpretation. You’re either miserable with unrequited love or we’re dating. And,” she grins as she gives him a very obvious once-over, “you’re a really good-looking guy, you’re sweet, you bring me coffee multiple times a day…I’m just surprised you weren’t snapped up way before I met you. You must have some hidden flaw.”

“I…I didn’t mean to keep it from you. I didn’t want you to feel pressured--”

“Clark.” Her voice softens. Her hand falls over his forearm. “It’s okay. I can imagine this is kind of awkward and there’s probably not a right way to do this. So…you want to come in and have dinner?”

“I’d love to,” he says honestly, and is rewarded with her smile.

***

“This is your place,” she observes halfway through dinner. “Not mine.”

It relieves him, in some ineffable way, that this part of her has not changed. Her insightfulness, her blunt way of intuiting truth and then stating it. There’s something awe-inspiring about it in the best of times, and more amazing that now, with no context, she is still able to parse out truths from the multitude of details surrounding her.

“It is.” He lets her see his curiosity. “How could you tell?”

“Please, Jimmy already told me I started at the Planet right after college, and from what I can tell, I’m pretty much a workaholic. There’s no way I had time to travel the world and collect all these souvenirs--or read that many books. You, on the other hand, strike me as exactly the kind of guy who travels places, notices things, and studies lots of random subjects.” She pauses. “Am I right?”

“You are.”

Her smile is triumphant. “I think I am getting the hang of this investigative thing.”

“Maybe still a bit distractible,” he teases, “since you were so busy getting one answer, you forgot to find out why we’re at my place instead of yours.”

“Well, that’s what I have you for, right?” she fires back. “You ask all the questions I don’t, notice the things I miss.”

He’s warmed by this assessment, his eyes softening. “I try,” he says. “Sometimes you don’t leave me a lot to do.”

She narrows her eyes at him, as if doubting the compliment. “Okay, so then, why are we here? We’re not living together, are we? I know I don’t have my memories so I can’t know what I’m like, but you seem more like a wedding-and-white-picket-fence kind of guy.”

He wishes he’d just get used to these random sucker-punches. He wishes they didn’t hurt so much.

(He wishes he didn’t deserve them all.)

“Do you know how you got hurt, Lois?” he asks.

She tilts her head, her vision unfocusing as if she’s searching through what remains of her memories. “I think the doctor said I had experienced multiple traumas to my brain. Something about hitting my head more than once in only a couple days. I guess I just assumed it happened while we were on a story.”

For just a moment, he contemplates going with it. Telling her that she was just staying with him for a few days for some mundane reason, that they’re working on straightening out her lease at her old place, letting her think they’re only dating.

But…he promised he wouldn’t lie to her.

And Lois, his Lois, is in there somewhere. If she comes back to him, if she remembers (when she remembers)…he doesn’t want her to ever think that he was trying to get out of marrying her. She’s oddly insecure at the strangest of times, and he can’t risk letting her think he wants to back out of their life together. For better or worse, she’s still his (because maybe she never got to say the vows, but he did, and he didn’t mean them for some copy of her).

So he leans forward on his elbows, makes himself smaller (less threatening), and says, “Lois, you were kidnapped. I didn’t know where you were. I couldn’t find you in time before…you were hurt getting away. You were confused, you thought you were someone else, and I…” He swallows hard. “Your kidnapper took advantage of that to lure you back to him. And by the time I…when Superman found you, the roof was caving in. Some of the rubble hit you. I’m sorry.”

“Clark.” She leans in, places her hand on the table near him. “It’s fine. There’s no way you could have stopped any of that. You’re a reporter, not a cop.”

“I’m your fiancé,” he blurts out. “You were taken from the church on our wedding day, Lois. I should have known something was wrong. I should have…I should have been able to save you.”

Shock. Shock and discomfort and disbelief and horror (all of his worst nightmares rolled up into one and he hasn’t even told her everything yet). She’s so easy to read, all of his Lois’s tells and none of her masks.

“I…I was going to marry you?”

The past tense hurts, like Kryptonite. Like finding out his wife wasn’t real. Like the weapon Luthor tortured him with.

“I-I don’t even know you,” she stammers, and then she’s up, tearing past him, ignoring his calls, darting up the stairs and out the door (out of his life).

“Lois!” he calls after her (after the Lois who’s gone, who was ripped away from him and taken out of his dumbstruck arms and wounded while she was held in his embrace as the roof caved in around them). “Lois, I love you.”

But the room is empty, and no one hears him (and even if she could, it would mean nothing to her).

***

He follows her from afar. Privacy’s something his parents really drummed into him in his teenage years, and he hates feeling like he’s spying on her, but for all her bravado, Lois is injured and confused (and Luthor had accomplices that were never caught). So Clark follows from the sky, far above her, hovering where she’s only on the edge of his hearing, the verge of his sight.

She wanders the streets, caught somewhere between aimlessness and purposefulness. When she finds her way to Centennial Park, Clark has to let his eyes drift closed, has to rely entirely on her steady heartbeat to keep him informed of her safety. It’s too much, too painful, too soon, to see her wandering the places that mean so much to him and mean nothing at all to her.

The park bench where he first told her he loved her.

The well where his powers were transferred to her.

The fountain where he proposed, and then where she proposed again.

So many moments. So many memories, and he never realized just how precious shared experiences could be until she was erased from all of his.

Clark finds a rooftop near the park and lands. His cape isn’t warm, but he craves an embrace (her embrace; she’s so small, so human, and he could completely enfold her, but when she hugged him, he felt strong and safe) and wrapping the red fabric around him will have to do. He wishes his parents were there, just long enough to give him some wisdom, some comfort, and to enclose him in their own strengthening hugs.

But there’s only him. Him and his fiancée (or is she? is he only engaged to the Lois who remembers and knows and loves him?). Apart. Alone. Lonely.

Eventually, Lois meanders out of the park and turns back toward his apartment. But it’s late and she’s had a full day (and he craves her presence), so Clark squares himself into Superman and descends from the skies.

“Superman!” she exclaims. “What are you doing here?”

“Just…checking around. Making sure everything’s okay.”

This is just like old times--picking and choosing his words so carefully to avoid lies, lying all the while with his appearance and his manner. He feels as if he is crawling through a minefield, each word liable to trigger an explosion he’ll only feel when he steps forward off the mine, thinking he is safe.

Instead of feeling nostalgic, he feels sick. He doesn’t like this. He loved her knowing his secret. He loved that there were no more lies, no more omissions, no more evasions, just truth and inside jokes and private signals and secret smiles. He loved that she knew him, all of him, and loved him still (anyway, despite, because of, he doesn’t even care anymore if only she will love him again).

“Hi,” she finally says, her expression equal parts awe, amusement, and surprise. “So I guess we know each other.”

“We used to,” he says. “But I understand that things are different now.”

“Sorry,” she offers with a grimace. “Every time I start feeling frustrated at everything I’m missing, I realize that it’s probably worse for the people who do remember. At least I don’t know what I’m missing.”

“It’s okay if you’re having a hard time.” He frowns, not liking the idea that she feels guilty. “None of this was your fault, and it must be difficult. Playing a strange part in the middle of everyone who already knows all the lines you’re still learning.”

Strangely, he actually can relate. When he first became Superman, the world seemed more comfortable with who he was and what he was there for (thanks to a certain reporter who set the stage for him with her explosive articles) than he was himself.

“Exactly!” Lois gifts him a smile. “So…any chance you’re flying in the direction of Clinton Street?”

Despite the situation, he laughs. “I’m always available to fly you, Ms. Lane.”

A flicker of uneasiness passes over her face before she smiles again. “I may not remember much, but there’s no way I’m stupid enough to turn down an offer like that.”

“Then let’s fly.”

He swoops her into his arms and up to the sky before she can think better of it. He’s so happy to see her smiling again, so relieved that she’s planning on going back to Clark’s apartment, so worried about just how close he is to breaking his promise of honesty. All of that, though, fades compared to the feel of her in his arms, cradled against his heart, warm and willing and so excited at the view.

“I always knew I was meant to fly!” she exclaims.

“You did?” He laughs.

“Of course.” She hesitates, then says, “Actually, I’ve been having these dreams about flying. I always feel so safe. So relaxed. So…”

“I love flying,” he says, mainly just to encourage her to keep talking. He’s flying as slow as he can, but they’ll still arrive at his place far too soon.

“Superman…” Lois bites her lip. “We’ve gone flying before, haven’t we? Do you think that’s what the dreams were--memories?”

“I don’t know.” He tries not to let her see the depth of his longing. “What do you think?”

“Well, one of the dreams, I felt…” She takes a deep breath and studies him closely. Clark feels his old insecurities coming back, the fear of being examined too closely, the paranoia that anyone really looking at him will see something that will lead to his entire life crashing in on him. (But then, his life already has crashed in, hasn’t it?)

“Superman,” she says slowly, “exactly how close were we?”

“We’ve gone through a lot together.” He gulps and darts a quick glance at her.

“But we’re friends, right?” Lois’s eyes are tight, her hands clenched. “I mean, Clark and I…you help both of us with our stories. Right?”

“Lois.” Clark sets her down in front of his apartment and steps back (his hands are reluctant to truly part from her warmth, lingering a beat too long). “I hope someday very soon you’ll remember.”

Then, with a flash of his cape, he flees (the temptation of) her presence.

***

When Clark opens the door to Lois’s tentative knock, he’s disappointed to see that she looks nervous. Almost…afraid.

“Lois,” he says with a touch of relief. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” After just a beat, she says, “Can I come in?”

“Oh, right, I’m sorry, of course. Look, Lois, I know you don’t…you don’t know me, and I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. So…if you want to get a hotel room, or maybe we could call Star--she’s a friend of yours--and she could stay here with you, or--”

“When did we fall in love?” she demands.

“Um…” He blinks at her. “We… What do you mean?”

She stomps her way down the stairs and plops herself down on the couch. He’d tried to clear out most of the photos of them together when she was in the bathroom before dinner, but he didn’t have the heart to hide all of them away. She stares at the one of them smiling together, the engagement ring clear on her finger, as if the sight of it has swallowed up all her words.

He should have put it in the drawer with the rest.

“I can’t just walk around with this hole in the middle of my life,” she finally says. “So tell me. When did we fall in love? How long did we date? How long were we engaged? Why did I love you?”

For the first time, Clark begins to think that maybe he should have let Luthor pull the trigger on that weapon of his just once more. It’s a terrible thing to think, and he knows that if he’d died, Lois and maybe his mom and who knows who else would be dead, too, so he pushes the thought far away.

It’s just that he’s tired. He’s tired and he hurts and he’s terrified of all the pain waiting to be sprung on him in the days to come.

But it’s Lois asking. Lois, and he can’t leave her alone. He can’t leave her lost and confused.

“Well,” he says, joining her on the couch, though he makes sure to leave a cushion between them. “I think I fell in love with you the first time I ever saw you. I was in the middle of an interview with Perry and you burst in like a tornado, barely even glanced at me, but…I was so struck by your sureness. You’re so absolute in everything you do, so determined and bold. But, well, you told me not to fall for you.”

“Obviously, you didn’t listen,” she comments.

“I tried,” he admits. “But it was too late. Anyway, you needed a friend more than anything, so that’s what I tried to be.”

“I think…” She gives him a shy smile. “Well, you’ve been a good friend to me.”

“Thank you. You’re my best friend, always.”

“But…I must have eventually noticed you.”

“We had a lot of obstacles,” he admits (so carefully, so cautiously). “But yeah, you did. There were a lot of things that could have separated us, but you always fought for me, Lois. First as a friend, then as more. We started dating about a year ago, though we had a couple stumbles there, too. And then I asked you to marry me in September.”

“So…we’ve been engaged a while.”

“You said no.” At her stricken look, he hurries to add, “You didn’t think we were ready. And…I mean, it hurt, but you were right, Lois. We still had a lot to learn about each other. And then, in November, you asked me to marry you.”

“And did you say yes?” she asks, a mischievous gleam in her eyes.

He grins back. “In so many words.”

Her smile fades as she leans back into the couch. “And then the wedding came and you didn’t get a bride. I’m sorry, Clark.”

“It’s not your fault,” he says fiercely. “I’m sorry. You warned me you had a bad feeling about it, that you thought something was going to happen, and I thought it was just nerves. I thought…well, you’d…you’d had a bad experience with weddings before, and I thought you were just gun-shy. I should have listened to you. I should have--”

“Clark!” She grabs his hands, and his breath catches in his throat. “Clark, it’s okay, really. I don’t blame you, and I’m pretty sure that even if I remembered everything, I still wouldn’t blame you.”

“I’m still sorry,” he whispers, unable to look away from her hands on his. “I’d give anything to have been there for you when you needed me.”

“You’re here now.” She’s staring at their hands, too. “That counts, Clark. I promise.”

***

She sleeps in the bedroom. He sleeps on the couch, lulled into dreams by the steady metronome of her heartbeat. He dares to hope that things might be looking up (she trusts him, she touched him, she believes him) when, in the morning, she asks if he’ll let her go into work on her own.

“It’s nothing against you,” she promises. “I just want to talk to Perry about some things.”

“Yeah,” he says (her masks may be gone, but he can still use his, even if they are dusty and creaky with disuse). “That’s fine. I need to go by your old apartment anyway, see if they’ve rented it yet.”

“Thanks,” she says.

She eats the eggs he cooks for her, thanks him for breakfast, then she’s gone, the keys to her Jeep in hand. Clark flies above her just long enough to make sure she makes it to the Daily Planet, and then heads for Smallville.

***

His parents console and counsel him, then send him back to Metropolis with renewed determination to be and do whatever Lois needs him to be and do. Lois is sitting at her desk when he comes into the newsroom; she greets him with a strained smile but doesn’t come to talk to him. Clark talks to Jimmy long enough to find out she’s still reading through her old stories, then heads in to check in with Perry.

“How are you doing?” Perry asks without even a beat in between. “She take the news all right?”

“Well enough,” Clark says, not exactly wanting to confess that she ran away as soon as he told her. She doesn’t seem to mind the idea of them dating, he reminds himself for the tenth time. “She has a lot of questions.”

“I’ll say.” Perry laughs outright. “Son, that’s the best thing for her. Lois doesn’t think in absolutes, she thinks in questions. Leave her be and I bet she’ll be back to normal in no time.”

“I hope so, Chief.” Clark tries to sound optimistic, but inwardly, he’s not so sure. The more he thought on all the obstacles he mentioned so sparingly to Lois, the things that came between them and the moments that almost destroyed them, the more he’s beginning to think that maybe he was right that time he decided to break up with Lois. Not right to break up with her, but right when he said that he was bad luck to her.

Maybe they’re not meant to be together. Maybe he’s just been denying the inevitable, fighting fate, trying to make a future for them together. Maybe his insistence on her loving him as much as he loves her is just going to keep hurting her, over and over and over again.

But he doesn’t know how to say any of that. Doesn’t know how to let Perry know just how helpless he feels.

“Be there for her,” his mom told him.

“You love her, son,” his dad said. “Just love her, and I’m sure you’ll do everything you’re supposed to.”

He’s loved her for almost three years. It comes naturally to him. So he does his best to put aside his misgivings and pretend she is Lois from a couple years before, his friend and his partner but only on conditions. He brings her coffee and lets her be. He fetches her lunch and goes back to his own desk. He makes sure she takes a few breaks by joking with Jimmy in her vicinity and pulling her into the conversation.

It doesn’t seem to do any good.

She becomes more and more withdrawn as the day progresses. Her shoulders hunch tighter every hour, her frown growing into a full-on scowl as she squints at her computer.

“Jimmy!” he hears her call just when he’s thinking of calling it a day.

“What is it?” Jimmy asks (he talks intentionally loudly, his subtle way of making sure Clark catches on). “You need something?”

“Why aren’t there any stories from May of 1994 to almost August?”

“Uh…” Jimmy sends a quick supplicating glance to Clark before biting the bullet. “That’s when you were engaged to Lex Luthor. The Planet blew up, and it took a while to bring it back.”

Lois gapes up at him, stunned. “I was engaged to Lex Luthor?”

“Yeah.” Jimmy smiles sadly at her. “But don’t worry--you didn’t actually marry him.”

“Lois,” Clark says, shoving back his chair and standing, all of his protective instincts flaring. “I think it’s time to head home. I mean, head to the apartment. Come on. You must be starving.”

She comes. Docile. Compliant.

Cowed.

Clark hates it.

***

“Let’s play a board game,” he says abruptly after dinner, when she’s hardly said a word and he can feel her slipping away from him. “How about Scrabble? Or Monopoly, maybe. You always like Monopoly--it appeals to your gloating instincts.”

That conjures up the ghost of a smile from her. “All right, fine,” she says, a bit ungraciously. “We’ll see if I remember how to play that game.”

His brow creases in confusion, but he pulls the game out of the closet and sets it up without comment. Lois chooses the car as her piece, just as she always does, a hopeful enough sign that Clark’s almost smiling when he chooses the dog.

“The dog?” Lois arches an eyebrow. “Loyal and dependable, huh?”

“Cars break down, Lois,” he says, his playfulness only somewhat forced. “Plus, dogs are much cheaper to maintain and they love you back.”

“Give me a break.” She rolls her eyes and tosses the dice.

Clark loves playing games with Lois. She doesn’t lose with dignity (or, truthfully, without a lot of kicking and screaming) and she isn’t the most gracious of winners, but she puts her all into it. She’s alight with childlike pleasure when she’s winning, and flush with fierce resolve to better her fortunes when she’s losing. She laughs and gloats and plots and never ever lets him grow bored. Clark can barely pay attention to the game at all, too entranced by her every move.

And he thinks she knows it. As the game progresses, she grows looser, more relaxed, her gestures less controlled, her laughs less constrained. She leans over the board, so close to him he shudders at the suggestion of her body heat. Her hands reach out for his, to count the money when she judges him too slow, to move his own piece, to protest the roll of the dice. When it’s his turn, he can feel her eyes raking over him, studying him, and for once, he doesn’t wish he could disappear. Instead, he feels bolder. Braver. Stronger.

She’s looking at him. She’s here with him. She’s laughing because of him.

It’s not the same. It’s not love or a wedding or marriage. But it’s friendship and trust and something. It’s honest. It’s genuine.

(It’s hope.)

He loves it.

***

Unfortunately, her good mood doesn’t last the day at the Daily Planet. Whatever she’s getting out of her old stories, it doesn’t seem to be reassuring her at all (Clark hopes it’s not because so many of them are headed by his name linked to hers). Jimmy starts hiding from her calls, Perry visits Lois’s desk repeatedly and once talks to her behind closed doors (Clark has to flee the building in order to keep himself from listening in).

That night, after a couple games of Scrabble (four because Lois kept insisting she’d win the next game, until finally she declared his dictionary useless and refused to admit that he’d won), Clark gathers his courage.

“Lois,” he says. “I was thinking, maybe tomorrow, you could go out on a story with me. You’ve been catching up for a while now. Nothing will get you feeling back to normal more than chasing down a lead. What do you think?”

“I don’t know.” Before he can recover from his shock, she shrugs disinterestedly. “You think Perry will go for it?”

“Perry can’t wait to have his best reporter back on the job,” Clark says as he studies her. “If you’re worried that you won’t know what to do, you shouldn’t be. It’s pretty much in your blood, no memories required.”

Her lips twitch. “All right. I guess.”

It’s lukewarm agreement, but he takes it.

(He misses having a partner as much as he misses having a fiancée.)

***

As he hoped, Lois comes alive on the story. It’s not huge, probably page four or five if they’re lucky (or if Perry’s intent on bolstering Lois’s confidence), but just having Lois at his side, listening to her ask question after question, trying to catch up to her as she enters a door forbidding entrance…it feels wonderful. It feels like old times. It feels like he’s watching his Lois come back to him minute by minute.

So when they find the last piece of information they need to tie the story together, when Lois throws her arms up in the air with a gleeful shout, when she turns to him with her smile as radiant as the sun…Clark forgets.

He forgets that she doesn’t know him.

He forgets that she doesn’t love him.

He forgets that he doesn’t deserve her.

His arms wrap around her, her hands are warm on his shoulders, her laugh is resounding in his ears--and he kisses her.

It’s over almost before it begins, his sanity returning just a split second too slow.

Too late.

Clark stumbles back immediately (his arms empty, his heart hollow), his hands held out before him to show he won’t try anything (as if she can believe him now).

Lois stares at him for a long second while he tries to think of something to say (anything to say that will keep her from avoiding him or flinching from him) before she abruptly smiles at him.

“It’s fine, Clark,” she says. “Really, it’s okay. Don’t worry about it.”

But he does. Endlessly.

(Did she like it? Did it bring back any memories for her? Will she ever let him kiss her again?)

She, however, seems to forget it entirely.

(He doesn’t know why he’s surprised.)

***

His parents surprise them with a visit. Martha takes Lois shopping while Jonathan goes with Clark to finalize the details on her apartment. Clark doesn’t want to admit it, but he’s been dragging his feet on this. It terrifies him, the thought of her moving out of his place, back to hers, and then just…forgetting him. Logically, he knows they work together and he can come see her like he’s done a million times before, but…but emotionally, he’s so afraid that the minute she has her own place to live and her own stories to write, she’ll consign the chapter of her life containing him into the past (a past she doesn’t even remember). Just move on and learn all new things, create new memories free of him.

When he speaks with the landlord, his dad is a solid support behind him, bolstering his strength of will and providing silent moral impetus to do this for Lois. (He can’t be selfish with her, not again.)

Martha and Lois come back from shopping laughing at something they refuse to explain. Lois hugs Martha when they leave (Clark follows his parents out the door without explanation, and Lois doesn’t ask where he’s been when he gets back from flying them to the farm) and smiles warmly at Jonathan.

“Thanks for coming,” she says.

But when Clark gets home (“She remembers more than you think,” his mom whispered in his ear when he hugged her goodbye) and asks her if she wants to play a game, Lois shakes her head.

“No,” she says quietly. “I think I’m just going to go into bed.”

“Okay. Good night.”

“Hey, Clark?”

He turns to face her, paused on the threshold to the bedroom. “Yeah?”

“Am I going to be able to move back into my old place?”

His heart contracts painfully. “Yeah, sorry, I forgot to tell you. It’s all set. You just have to sign a few papers, and it’s all yours. Did you want to do that tomorrow?”

“Oh.” She chews on her lip for a minute (Clark tries, futilely, not to hope that it’s because she doesn’t want to leave him). “It was taking so long I’d actually started looking at a few other places.”

“What?”

“Well, I wouldn’t have been surprised if the place was already gone. Besides, I thought it might be nice to have a new place. Kind of start over again with a clean slate.”

Clark’s struck speechless. Panicked. His fight-or-flight reaction landing firmly in freeze uselessly (like it did before, when Wanda told him she didn’t love him and Luthor drove her away).

It’s exactly as he feared: she wants to forget him entirely.

“Never mind.” Lois smiles halfheartedly. “If it’s still open, that’s fine. I guess I can sign the papers tomorrow. Actually, we were going to go talk to Bobby Bigmouth, remember, introduce me again--why don’t we do the papers the day after tomorrow?”

“Okay,” he says numbly.

“Good night, Clark.”

She leaves him alone, frantically trying to figure out how to win her heart again in less than two days.

***

There’s a cry for help before Bobby Bigmouth arrives. Just as he turns his head toward the cry, Lois sighs heavily. “We forgot dessert. Didn’t you say he always insists on dessert?”

“Yes!” he almost shouts, desperate for this chance not to have to concoct some lame half-truth to get out of the Jeep. “I’ll go get it. Wait here.”

That was his mistake. Memories or no memories, he should have known that telling Lois Lane to wait anywhere was a surefire way of ensuring that she got into some kind of trouble.

When Clark gets back to the Jeep, it’s empty, the food’s all gone, and Lois is missing. His insides are scalded with terror and he’s certain (so certain his veins run cold with ice) that Luthor’s actually alive, that he somehow survived (like a cockroach) all that rubble and the clone’s sacrifice. He’s back and he has Lois again and Clark will never be able to find her and--

And that’s her heartbeat, just a block away, quick and irritated but not scared-for-her-life-fast. Clark blurs past the motionless world and Superman appears like magic with the thug held up so high his feet dangle in the air, his gun fallen uselessly to the ground.

“Whoa!” Lois stares at him, then down at her suddenly free hands, and then she lets out a brief laugh. “Wow. Okay. Thank you, Superman. Apparently, he thought I’d be an easy target.”

“No,” Superman says (anger’s like rocks in his flesh, green and glowing and dangerous). “I recognize him. You’re with Intergang, aren’t you? This probably has to do with that story you wrote linking Mindy Church to the crime group.”

Lois folds her arms over her chest. “You sure know a lot about my stories.”

That’s enough to pull Clark’s attention from the man he’s holding in a grip just shy of dangerously strong. “What?”

“I just read that article a couple days ago. I didn’t even quote you in it. In fact, you weren’t in it at all.”

“I do read the Daily Planet,” he says wryly, but it doesn’t seem to reassure her. “Look, I’ve got to take him to the police. Are you going to be okay here? I can come back if--”

“No. Clark’s going to be here any minute. I’m fine, Superman, thank you.” She’s backing away, shaking her head, avoiding his gaze.

(Superman, she’d said with disbelief. He’s an alien?)

“Okay. Be careful, Lois.”

(Superman, she’d asked so rigidly, exactly how close were we?)

“Sure.”

Clark watches her go, and for all his invulnerability, he feels sick.

***

Clark’s already at the Jeep when Lois makes it back. She walks straight up to him without even acknowledging his utterance of her name--and she hugs him. Steps right into him, buries her face in the crook of his neck, wraps her arms around his shoulders, and her body trembles. Clark doesn’t hesitate in closing his arms around her, cradling the back of her head in a palm, and savoring every sensation.

“Oh, Clark,” she murmurs, and shudders.

“Lois,” he breathes. “It’s okay. It’s okay, I’m here.”

She shudders again, and there’s a spot of wet salt against his neck.
But eventually, when her trembling’s eased and her arms loosen, Lois pulls back. She tells him what happened, but she doesn’t explain the hug.

And Clark’s a coward (too afraid of the answer) and doesn’t ask her the reason for it.

(He’s afraid it means goodbye.)

***

Her moods have been so strange that Clark isn’t sure he expected her to say yes when he invites her out for dinner that night.

“Yes,” she says with a smile, and Clark checks himself.

“Like a date,” he clarifies. “You and me, out together, on a date-date.”

“I know.” Her amused smile is softened at the edges by fondness (so familiar it makes his heart ache). “I may not have known my name until you told me what it is, but I haven’t forgotten what a date is. I’d love to go with you, Clark.”

For the first time in days, Clark lets himself feel hopeful.

He hopes it is enough (his time is running out).

***

Though he gets ready inside the apartment, he leaves early so that Lois can ready herself in private. She laughs when he knocks on the door and waits for her to answer it.

“For you,” he says, proffering the forget-me-nots.

Her smile is almost wistful as she takes the flowers. “That’s kind of an odd choice, Clark, considering our circumstances.”

“I know.” He shrugs. “But maybe they can be our private joke.”

“Or maybe we can just hope I don’t forget you again.”

She’s teasing. He knows it. He knows it.

It hurts.

(Isn’t that what she’s going to do? Move out and move on and leave him behind?)

Lois’s eyes soften as she looks back at him. “I won’t, Clark,” she promises.

“I know.” He does his best to offer her a smile. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. You’re…you’re being so good to me that sometimes I forget how hard this must be for you. You lost the woman you love, on your wedding day no less.”

Daringly, Clark reaches out to hold her hand. “You’re still here, Lois. I didn’t lose you.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yes,” he admits, “but even without your memories, you’re still Lois. Drive and bravery and stubbornness and hatred for injustice and compassion--you’re still you. You’re still the woman I love.”

With a sharp breath, her eyes flutter closed (he can’t tell if she’s savoring the moment or holding back a denial). “Oh, Clark,” she murmurs when she meets his eyes again, and it’s her voice, the tone, the intonation, everything the same as always when she says his name in these tender moments.

It’s a victory, and Clark exults in it. Lets it color the rest of the evening. Allows it to embolden him when he talks to her. When he reaches for her hand and weaves their fingers together. When they leave the restaurant and walk side by side. When she’s standing beneath the halo of a streetlamp and her eyes are like stars burning mysteriously and her frame is so close to his (and he envisions a different wedding night, where she is not a clone and she does not sleep and he does not sneak away to go flying).

(He told her he loves her, still, always, now, and she said nothing but his name. She stayed. She came with him. She’s standing at his side.)

“Clark,” she says just before he can do something crazy (something stupid) like kiss her. “Have I always put my life in danger?”

“You can be a little reckless,” he allows, perhaps more affectionately than he would have ordinarily sounded, drunk on her company and on hope. “But it’s only because you want to help. You want to make a difference. You want to change the world. Unfortunately, that comes with a lot of danger attached.”

“I know, but did I always get into trouble or…or just since Superman was around to save me?”

“What?”

“Well, I know that you didn’t move to Metropolis very long before Superman arrived, but we must have talked. Was I always tied up over vats of acid and thrown off of buildings and nearly vaporized by evil geniuses’ inventions? Or did I just get really, really foolhardy when Superman showed up to save me all the time?”

“I…I don’t know.” Clark suddenly isn’t having any trouble staying weighted to the ground. “You think knowing Superman puts you in danger?”

“No, I think knowing that Superman is always going to show up has made me way more reckless than I used to be.”

Try as he might, he can’t read her face. “Why are you bringing this up?”

Her sigh is so heavy he feels the force of it even from several inches away. “I don’t want you to get your hopes up, Clark, and I don’t know that it means anything, but…I remembered something.”

“You did?”

He tries. Oh, how he tries. To stay calm. To not let his heart rate jump. To not immediately envision Lois waking up tomorrow with all her memories intact, frantically looking for the engagement ring he keeps in his pocket.

He fails.

“Yeah. It was while that guy had me at gunpoint this morning.” She rolls her eyes, as if exasperated by the whole experience (Clark can’t help but smile). “Anyway, there was this whoosh right before Superman showed up, and I…I just remembered a lot of falling and screaming and nearly dying. And,” her voice drops so low an ordinary man wouldn’t hear it, “a lot of Superman flying to the rescue.”

“And that bothers you?” he asks, not even sure if he means her being in danger or Superman coming to her call.

“It doesn’t bother you?” she counters.

“You being in danger always bothers me. But, Lois, if you’re worried that Superman won’t get there in time, I guess I can’t blame you after these past few weeks, but--”

“No, Clark, I’m worried that I--” But she cuts herself off. staring at him as he waits breathlessly for her answer. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter.”

Clark lets her direct them back toward his apartment, and almost doesn’t even notice that their path will take them along the outskirts of Centennial Park.

“Have…” He clenches his hands into fists. “Have you remembered anything else?”

“A few things,” she admits, almost reluctantly. “I remembered some things from when I was a kid--my dad being gone, my mom crying, getting a bike for Christmas even though I wanted a jet, a real one, not a dinky toy. I remember investigating and asking questions, that feeling I get when I’m on the trail of something really big. I remember Perry and Elvis and I think I remember Jimmy wearing my dress? Maybe I just made that one up.”

“No, the Prankster, he could freeze people and he liked practical jokes.”

“Oh, right, when the President came to town, right? I mean, one of the times the President came to town, way before this last time with the clones.”

Clark tenses, all his reaction to the fact that she’s remembered everyone but him subsumed beneath his guilt. His shame. His regret.

“It’s okay, Clark.” Lois threads her hand over his elbow and leans a bit of her weight against him. “Perry told me that there was a clone of me. He said that you noticed the difference before anyone else. He thought you’d gone crazy--and I think he still feels bad about that. It didn’t even take you very long, right?” Her chuckle is so fake that Clark actually winces to hear it. “Just a couple days.”

“She wasn’t you,” he blurts out. “I did know earlier, I knew something was wrong, but I…I think I was just afraid to admit it. I’m sorry, Lois.”

She looks away, out at the park across the street. “I’m not really the Lois you knew either, you know that, don’t you, Clark?”

“I told you, you--”

“I know, but I don’t have any of the memories you treasure, none of the shared experiences. It’s not the same.”

“It’s enough,” he tells her firmly.

Strangely, her sigh almost sounds disappointed. (Does she want him to give up on her?) “Anyway, I guess the clone was really different, huh?”

“She was.” For just a moment, Clark sets aside his regret just long enough to remember the clone. The way she was so happy to help him. The look in her eyes when she told him she loved him. The fear she pretended away when she agreed to help him. The sound of her heartbeat dimming as she grappled with Luthor to save Clark’s life.

“She wasn’t all bad,” he says. “Just really young and very misguided. In the end, she wanted to help. She died helping me save you.”

Lois tilts her head quizzically. “You were there, too? I thought…I thought Superman was the one who pulled me out.”

Clark freezes. He can’t lie. He won’t lie. But…but she backed away from Superman and she agreed to a date with Clark and he doesn’t want to mess this up.

But Lois just smiles and squeezes his arm where she’s looped her hand. “Thank you, Clark. That means a lot.”

“You’re welcome,” he says, and pretends that he isn’t lying to her all over again.

***

“So, here we are.” He smirks down at her when he stops in front of the front door to his place (to their place, he thinks, even if just for one more night). “Door to door service.”

“Is that a Kansas thing?” She laughs at him.

“It’s a Clark Kent thing,” he says, a weak response, but she’s staring up at him and her mouth is so close to his and they’re on a date, after all, and she is Lois so it wouldn’t be cheating to bridge the distance between them. To set his mouth over hers and kiss her like he used to.

“Clark Kent,” she muses. “You’re not like I thought you’d be.”

“What?” His laugh is just a bit uncomfortable. “When? What did you think I’d be like?”

“When I was at the hospital and the only one who’d come to see me was you. I thought…I don’t know, I thought you were just a co-worker, and you’d done your duty and I’d never see you again. But then you came and you took me to the Daily Planet, you showed me who I was, you…” She gives herself a slight shake. “I guess you’re just one of a kind.”

“Yeah, that’s me.” He shouldn’t, he knows, but he’s so tired, so impatient, and he has only this night. “So why do you think you haven’t remembered me?” He forces a laugh as he looks away. “I mean, you don’t think it’s because you don’t want to remember me, right?”

“Clark…”

“No, I’m sorry.” He scrubs a hand back over his hair. “I shouldn’t have said that. This isn’t your fault, Lois, and I’m not pressuring you, I promise. I’m sorry.”

“Maybe I don’t have to remember you because I’m getting to know you all over again and you’re just as good and sweet and great as ever. Maybe you haven’t changed so learning you is just the same as remembering you.”

It’s a kind answer (he pretends that it’s enough).

“Thanks for going to dinner with me,” he says to give her an out of the awkward situation he’s created.

“Thanks for asking me. This has been a great night, Clark. Really, the best I can remember.”

He watches her, barely breathing, hoping for miracles, or failing that, just a touch of grace.

“Come in for coffee?” she asks. And he doesn’t know if she’s still carrying on the joke that he doesn’t live here or if she’s actually inviting him in for coffee (or if she’s offering more, kisses and caresses and her heart), but whatever she’s offering, he accepts it. Eagerly. Intently.

Desperately.

***

They drink coffee. She teases him. He watches her, mesmerized, and tries to remember to respond every once in a while.

When the coffee is gone, she sets their cups in the sink. Turns to face him. And says, “Clark, I don’t think I want to go back to my old apartment. I’ll find someplace new. And I think I’m going to ask Perry for a reassignment. Something different.”

And then, before he can do anything more than flinch at the pain of this latest hit, she turns and heads into the bedroom.

***

They go out on a story together. Truthfully, Clark recruits Perry to his cause and then almost drags Lois with him, but he doesn’t regret it, not when she picks up on something he missed and starts trying to break into a section of dockyard that’s closed up.

“I don’t know why you think they’d be stupid enough to hide the stuff instead of get rid of it,” he says as he surreptitiously tugs the chain-link fence open for her.

She stares down as the padlock bounces to the floor before she shrugs and slips inside. “Trust me, Clark, most people don’t think they’re ever going to get caught. They don’t want to think about it, so they don’t, and that’s where they get tripped up.” She frowns abruptly. “And anyway, you don’t have to come if you don’t think that--”

“I think you’re right,” he interrupts her, and slides ahead so that he can guide her down the aisle that will hide them from the guard he hears up ahead.

Unfortunately, Lois stumbles right into the guard a bit later. They run and manage to lose him when Clark knocks some canisters over, but when he tries to convince Lois to head back, she digs her heels in.

“No, we’re already here, Clark! I’m not leaving until we get some evidence we can use to actually run this story.”

“That might not be the only guard here, Lois! This story isn’t worth your life.”

“Why are you always like this?” she demands as she rifles through the filing cabinet. “You always have to think everything through a hundred times before you make a decision--really, you’re so small-minded sometimes!”

“I am not!” he protests as he zaps the security camera in the corner of the ceiling with a shot of heat-vision. “And even if I am, it’s only because I’m trying to counter your impulsiveness! You don’t even bother breaking the rules--you just throw away the entire rulebook!”

“Nobody cares about rules, Clark. See?” She shows him the file she snatched before shoving it in her bag. “If we’d let a couple signs and some dumb rules stop us, we’d never be able to stop people like this.”

“There’s more than one way to stop--” Suddenly, Clark grabs her elbow. “Wait. Stop. What did you say?”

“I said, I found it. Now let’s get out of here--or did you want to stand around and wait until we get caught?”

Clark hurries her through the twisting maze of shipping containers, his heart pulsing like a strobe light. As soon as they’re out of the fence and a turn away, he grabs her again.

“Lois, did you hear what you said earlier? You said that I’m always like this. How would you know that unless you remembered?”

“I…” Her eyes fall away from his as she shifts her weight. “It’s…it’s just a figure of speech. I was caught up in the argument.”

“No, you…” He backs up a step, staring at her. “But you were using the same argument you used to. You said that--”

“It didn’t mean anything, Clark, I’m sorry.”

“But, Lois, you are remembering things and--”

“I don’t want to remember!” she cries, backing away from him.

Clark is speechless. He can’t speak. Can’t breathe. Can’t think.

“Oh,” is all he can say.

Lois’s body sags, and an instant later, she’s approaching him, reaching out with trembling hands. “Wait, Clark, I didn’t mean it like that.”

“How did you mean it then? Exactly?”

“I…I meant, I don’t think that I can be the person I was before. I don’t think I want to be her.”

“Why not?”

But she doesn’t answer, and Clark doesn’t know how to interpret that (how to interpret any of it except in the worst possible way, the only way that seems to fit).

They drive back to the Planet, and Lois writes the story, and Clark wonders what his life will look like without her in it.

***

“Clark, let’s get some dinner.” Lois is standing at his desk with a determined expression on her face. He’d ducked out for most of the day to be Superman (to pretend Superman isn’t just as affected by this as Clark), but he’s still not really working. It’s a good thing Perry’s being so lenient with him considering the circumstances.

“Sure,” he says. “Where did you want to go?”

“Back home,” she says firmly (a bolt of lightning pierces his heart at her calling his apartment that, even if it’s just because she doesn’t have anywhere else to go). “We’ll grab something to go. I think we need to talk.”

Clark hasn’t been able to think of anything else since that morning. Options and possibilities and nightmarish scenarios have run through his head non-stop, but now that it seems she’s going to give him the whole truth, he doesn’t think he wants to know. He almost thinks that it will be easier just dreading the worst than to have it actually confirmed.

Except…he’s done this before. Been afraid to say anything, afraid to shake up status quo and maybe lose her. Put off confessing everything and placing everything on the line. But when he finally did, she said yes. Yes to a date and yes to him being Superman and yes to a wedding.

And he’s just desperate enough to consider that maybe this will be another moment turned from nightmare to dream in Lois’s hands.

***

While Lois finishes cleaning up the dinner they hardly touched, Clark walks out onto his balcony. He hides the shaking of his hands by sticking them in his pockets. The sky’s dark above him, and because he is who he is, he can see stars glittering above the aura of light Metropolis exudes. He remembers all the times he’s floated up there, separate from the earth. And he remembers taking Lois up there, tied to this world he loves so dearly by her acceptance and her love. Now, seeing their cold beauty above him, he can’t quite decide if that sliver of sky is his refuge (from whatever Lois has to tell him) or his prison (when it is all that is left to him).

“Clark, I’m not trying to push you out of my life.”

At Lois’s voice, he turns to face her. She steps out onto the balcony, her arms wrapped around herself, her hair backlit by the light from inside. In contrast, he knows he stands in shadow, an unknown figure she’s trusted so openly even though she can’t remember him.

“After this morning,” she continues, “I did some thinking and realized that’s how it must look to you. And I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you think that. In fact, you might not believe this, but I was trying not to hurt you.”

“What do you mean?” He clenches his hands into fists within the concealment of his pockets. He should have sent her to that medical facility. He should have realized he couldn’t help her. “I know that I’ve…I’ve dumped a lot on you, and it’s completely understandable if you want space. You don’t know me, and--”

“I do know you, Clark.” She takes a tentative step nearer him. “You’re right. I have been remembering some things. But…but I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to forget them. I remember you telling me you loved me, and I blew you off for…” She looks away. “I remember comparing you to Superman, a lot, and not in a nice way. I remember getting asked out by some guy and looking over to your desk and seeing you really hurt and still saying yes anyway. I remember a lot of things, Clark, and I can’t understand why you asked that woman to marry you.”

Clark’s heart softens and turns pliable, his hands uncurling and reaching out for her as he takes a step closer. “Lois, no, that’s…that’s not everything. There’s so much more, so much better. If you remembered everything, you’d--”

“I think I was cheating on you, Clark,” and she’s crying now, her voice breaking, her shoulders hunching inward, and Clark can’t hold back any longer. He’s there, wrapping his arms around her, cradling her close, breathing her in and hoping his presence comforts her rather than frightens her.

“No, Lois, no, you would never do that.”

“I remember kissing Superman--and I know I had a crush on him to begin with, but he kissed my hand, Clark, and I was wearing your engagement ring, and I told