“What, Clark?” she asked, rising from her seat and walking towards him. “What do you want?”
He lifted his head to look at her. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”
Hope died. She remembered her place again, her role as the wacko-in-need-of-help. She stopped walking towards him, the faint and, frankly, totally unrealistic possibility of an affirming embrace between them fading with her dying hope. “So are we friends again?” she asked, instructing herself to settle for the attainable.
“Yes,” he replied. “Yes, we’re friends.”
“Good.”
And he’d said she wouldn’t ever lose him. Wow. That was some commitment for just friends. She studied him for some clue, some hint of why he was so determined to stick by her.
As her gaze roamed his face, their eyes met, and for a moment, she thought she saw something more in those dark brown eyes, some flicker of a deeper emotion that was usually hidden from her.
Then he blinked, flashed her a wry smile, and the moment was gone. Maybe she’d been fanciful to imagine it had even happened. “So...that stuff about your ankles,” he said. “That was for me?”
She nodded, feeling herself flush all over again.
“And the other things on your list?”
“All of it,” she replied. “Excuse me while I die of embarrassment here.”
He grinned. “I agree about the ankles. They’re very nice ankles.”
“Thank you. Just don’t bother to comment on the other stuff,” she added, “or I may have to kill you.”
He laughed. “You do know that’s impossible?”
********************
She was perched on the side of Clark’s desk, reading his latest story on the computer and helpfully pointing out how he could tighten up his writing style, when it happened.
“Lois!”
She’d barely turned around to locate who was calling her when she was enveloped by two strong arms and pressed up against a large body.
She froze.
Someone was speaking, but all she could hear was the rapid pounding of her own heart. All she could feel were the ropes of steel holding her prisoner. She was being suffocated, being forced unconscious so that they could do whatever they wanted with her. They’d violate her, use her in a sacrifice, offer her up to the numerous gods they worshipped in the name of their black magic.
And then, just as she was coming to her senses and getting ready to fight back, the ropes released her. She gasped, thankful for the reprieve.
There were voices talking, but they were still muffled by the sound of her own fear. Her assailant seemed to have disappeared, or, at least, she was no longer aware of his or her presence.
<<Lois.>>
She blinked. Discovered she was still in the Planet newsroom, surrounded by the quiet hubbub of work. She turned and found Clark hovering nearby.
“Are you okay?” he murmured.
She nodded. Just another incident in the life of a crazy woman. Her bottom lip trembled.
Dammit. Stop that, she commanded her lip.
“Here, sit down.” He guided her into his chair and then hunkered down in front of her. “That was Tiffany. Said she remembered you from before – she works in IT?”
Oh, yes. An exuberant girl with more enthusiasm than hard knowledge about the computer systems she was supposed to fix. Lois had given her a hard time about some stupid bug thing, she remembered.
So, apparently there was actually someone left at the Planet who remembered her, though why Tiffany regarded her as anything other than a pain in the *** was beyond Lois.
“Want me to fetch you some water?” offered Clark.
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine. Just give me a minute, okay?” She smiled, a rather wobbly affair because of her trembling lips.
“Sure.” He returned her tremulous smile with a much more reassuring one, then stood up and sat down at the next desk along.
She slid her gaze over to him. “Thanks for getting rid of her.”
“No problem,” he replied. He thumbed on the computer before him and began working. She was grateful for his lack of fuss, just leaving her to sit quietly for a while.
Poor Tiffany. Probably thought she was just being friendly, instead got an armful of neurotic nutcase. Lois hadn’t a clear idea of what had happened, but presumably Clark had noticed her terrorised face peeking over the top of Tiffany’s broad shoulders and had asked Tiffany to leave her alone.
“What did you tell her?” she asked.
He shrugged. “I just said you were a bit tired.”
Nice euphemism for nuts. Well, she supposed it didn’t really matter what he told Tiffany; she’d form her own opinion anyway and was no doubt already telling everyone she met all about it.
And that had been George’s ‘monster Clark’ situation, she supposed. She hadn’t exactly coped with it like he’d wanted her to. Panic had seized her, and Clark had needed to rescue her again. Of course, the whole thing had been over in a flash, so maybe if she’d had longer to think, George’s instructions would have kicked in.
She grimaced. Perhaps she should ask Clark to stop rescuing her in these situations so she could find out if she could manage on her own.
Anyway, after a few minutes her pulse was back to normal and she no longer felt on the verge of tears. Taking a deep breath, she stood up and went to stand behind Clark’s chair to watch him writing. “How’s it going?” she asked.
“Nearly done,” he said over his shoulder. “Then I guess it’s time you should be heading back to the clinic.”
She glanced at her watch, surprised to find that he was right. The day had passed really fast, and pretty well, notwithstanding her minor melt-down with Tiffany and the argument with Clark in the conference room. Meeting Perry had been a real highlight, but just simply being here, on her old patch, had been wonderful. Not too scary, and with a lot of familiar smells, sights and sounds that had really made her feel at home. And to cap it all, she might even have won back Clark as a friend.
Clark hit the enter key on his keyboard with a flourish and announced he was finished. Swivelling around on his chair to look up at her, he said, “I wondered if you felt up to a short flight?”
Oh, wow. “You mean...with you? Superman?”
He nodded. “If you’d like to.”
Would she? He was eyeing her carefully, and she knew why – last time he’d offered to take her flying, she’d freaked out on him. Well, she didn’t feel like freaking out today. Heck, she’d already had her quota of panic for the day, hadn’t she? So did she want to be held aloft by Clark, hundreds of feet in the air, flying over the high-rise buildings of Metropolis?
Hell, yes.
“Yes, I would,” she said. “Thank you for offering.”
He grinned; a grin so broad and full of delight it lit up his whole face. “Great!”
****************
It was windy up on the roof of the Planet. Not hurricane-force, but enough of a breeze to ratchet up her nerves just a little further. Did flying men suffer from turbulence? Would they be buffeted around in the breeze?
He must have noticed her nervousness, because he turned to her as they reached the roof and clasped both of her arms lightly. “Don’t worry, I haven’t dropped anyone yet,” he said with a confident smile. “At least, not accidentally,” he added with a wink.
She laughed, her voice sounding, to her ears, just a little too high-pitched to be completely natural. “Is that a recognised Planet interview technique these days?” she asked. “Standards really must be slipping.”
“Nah, it’s the slithery criminals who do the slipping,” he said, grinning. “I just can’t seem to hang on to them sometimes. But there’s no way I’ll let you go, Lois.”
She nodded. “Okay, I think you convinced me.”
“Honestly,” he insisted, turning serious for a moment. “You’ll be completely safe. And if you really don’t like it, you just have to say and I’ll land us right away. Okay?”
“Okay.”
He smiled. “Then I guess I’d better get changed.” He stepped back a pace and suddenly became a whirling blur of colours.
She gasped and took a step back. She’d never seen him put on such a visible, in-your-face display of his powers before. Usually, as she’d mused earlier, he kept his abilities hidden - to the point, sometimes, of complete make-believe. But this...this was awesome. Humbling.
And now Superman was standing before her – again, she’d only ever seen the superhero on TV before. Here he was in the flesh, his long, brilliant-red cape billowing out behind him, his muscular arms crossed and his legs planted like tree trunks on the concrete roof.
Then he let his arms fall to his sides and did a very Clark-like one-shouldered shrug. “It’s only me, Lois,” he said. “Still just Clark Kent, the farmer’s son from Kansas.”
Just Clark? No, she decided, Clark could never be a ‘just’ sort of a person. He was special. Unique.
And lifting her effortlessly into his arms. She slid an arm around his neck for balance and found herself almost face to face with him.
He smiled. “Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be,” she replied.
“Okay, here we go.”
Their take-off was like nothing she’d ever experienced before. She was used to the tremendous force of an aeroplane take-off, but this was more like travelling up a very smooth elevator at a fairly slow pace – if the elevator had been open-air. Still, she clung very tightly to his neck and didn’t dare look down.
“All right?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yes, fine.”
After a few minutes, she felt confident enough to take a look around. “Oh, wow!” she exclaimed, gazing with awe at the city below her.
“It’s great, isn’t it?” he murmured.
“It’s more than great, it’s beautiful,” she said, drinking in the sight of Metropolis, her home town, laid out before her. The sun was low in the sky, creating a warm, mellow light that made the buildings glow and the shadows hazy and long. She’d never realised how beautiful the city could look.
“Thank you,” she said, gazing up at him.
He beamed back at her. “My pleasure.”
Yes, it was, she thought. Up here, flying as free as a bird, he really seemed to be in his element. He smiled easily and there was no lines of tension around his eyes.
“You love this, don’t you?” she said. “Flying, I mean.”
“Yes,” he replied. “Up here, I can separate myself from all the stuff going on down there. I can do whatever I like – be whoever I like. It’s liberating.”
Oh, Clark. Even now, as happy as he was, there was that undertone of pain; the need to escape from something. What exactly was that something? And had it been the cause of his addiction to red kryptonite?
His identity seemed to be a big part of it, whatever it was.
“I...I think I heard somewhere that you’re an orphan,” she ventured. “That must have been hard for you.”
He looked down at her, clearly surprised by her remark. “It’s hard for all orphans,” he replied after a moment. “I was luckier than most – at least I knew my parents when I was a kid, and when they died, the foster homes I got sent to were better than many I’ve heard about since.”
She nodded. She’d heard the same stories, back in her days as a reporter. Of course, there were many warm-hearted and very skilful foster parents around, but there were also some real ogres – even more so back in the days when Clark had been a child. “Do you miss them?” she asked. “Your parents, I mean?”
“It’s been so long...I regret not knowing them when I was older, and there’s a whole bunch of family memories I wish I had, but it’s hard to say that I actually miss them,” he said. “I mean, this is the only life I’ve known...”
He stared out towards the horizon, his eyes growing distant – dredging up the few family memories he did have, perhaps? “I do know I’d be a totally different person if they hadn’t died,” he said after a pause.
“How so?”
“I think I’d have had a clearer idea of who I really am,” he replied. “I mean, I figured out a lot of stuff about myself eventually – some of it pretty recently - but I grew up feeling pretty confused. I wasn’t sure where I came from and where I was supposed to fit in. That’s the hardest thing for orphans.”
“And harder for you, because of being different.”
“Yeah.”
“So...is that what made you turn to...you know...drugs?” she asked, hoping that their renewed friendship allowed her to ask such a personal question – that he’d understand that she was just trying to know him better.
“Not really. That was something else entirely,” he said, his expression suddenly unreadable.
“Oh.” Clearly, he did mind the question. But remembering how he’d teased similarly personal details out of her, and how, in the end, she’d been grateful for his persistence, she decided to prod just a little further. “Anything I’d understand?” she prompted.
He shook his head. “No. It’s not something I really want to talk about, actually.”
“Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to bring up painful memories.”
“You didn’t,” he said. “It’s just kind of complicated.”
“Oh,” she replied. Nothing could be that complicated, surely. He was hiding something, and it hurt her just a little that he wasn’t prepared to share it with her. Hadn’t they just agreed they were friends again?
“Look, there’s the clinic,” he said, nodding in the direction of a dirty-white building near a green patch – their park.
Yes, that was the clinic, and Clark had neatly got himself off the hook of any further personal revelations. Well, she’d keep digging. She’d planned to get to know this new Clark better, and, darn it, that was exactly what she was going to do – with or without his help.
***************
Unfortunately, the plan had to be put on hold for a few days after Lois’s visit to the Planet. The outing had taken its toll on her still fragile constitution and she spent the next couple of days in bed with a bad cold. It didn’t help that her periods, which had stopped during her incarceration in Brazzaville, decided, at the same time, to make a come-back with a vengeance. There was nothing much worse, Lois decided miserably, than spending an afternoon in bed with the stomach cramps from hell while at the same dealing with a streaming cold and a chesty cough. Men had no idea how lightly they got off.
Still, at least it gave her time to reflect on a suggestion Francine had made before the cold had struck. The clinic, apparently, had a couple of studio apartments available for patients. They were self-contained units, with a bedroom, a kitchenette/living room and a bathroom, and their purpose was to help patients to practice living independently while still having the safety-net of the clinic facilities on-site if they got into serious difficulties. Would Lois like to move into one of these?
Mostly, she decided, the idea was appealing. She’d miss the familiarity of the room she’d made her own for the past couple of months or more, but on the other hand, she’d enjoy a little more space to call her own. She’d have to shop, cook and clean for herself, but even that was a bonus; now that she was feeling more confident in herself, she was beginning to get a bit bored with the hotel-like service the clinic provided. She needed things to do.
Where would the cash come from to pay for her shopping, she enquired. Well, she’d be given a daily allowance by the clinic, although she’d be encouraged to begin seeking out ways of making money of her own.
That part was daunting. The only job she knew was journalism, and there was no way she felt up to holding down a reporting job anywhere. She flirted briefly with the idea of a weekly column in the Planet, but somehow she didn’t think ‘”Tales From the Nuthouse” would sell many newspapers. So the job was a problem.
The rest was okay, though. Yes, she decided, she’d accept Francine’s offer.
***************
The plan swung back into action once the cold had abated to the occasional sneeze and a runny nose. Perry had invited her to dinner when they’d met at the Planet, and since then Alice had been in touch with a few suggested dates. Lois was now booked in for dinner at the Whites’ in a couple of days’ time. She intended to use the occasion to find out everything Perry and Alice knew about Clark.
In the meantime, she embarked on another project: reading back issues of the Planet. The official aim of this particular project was to find out what had been going on in the world while she’d been incarcerated in Brazzaville. This was an aim very much approved of by Francine, who was pleased to see her taking an interest in life outside the cosseted world of the clinic.
Lois wasn’t so sure what Francine would have made of the unofficial aim of her project: to investigate Clark Kent and the rise of Superman. Lately, Francine had been hinting that Lois ought to spend less time thinking about Clark and more time thinking about herself. Lois reflected darkly – and silently - that she’d spent the last three months or so thinking about nothing other than herself; it was about time she got a break. Besides, Clark was her friend and she cared about him. Francine could go take a-
But no, that wasn’t fair on the motherly therapist. She’d been wonderful when Lois had been like a frightened small child, and Lois would forever be in her debt for being so patient with her. It was just that Francine didn’t always seem to understand what Lois needed. The Clark thing was a good case in point: Francine had only hinted at disapproval when, if she’d stated her case with conviction and a good dose of hard talking, Lois might have listened. Francine was just too darned nice.
Annoyingly, George’s secretary hadn’t yet given her a date to see him, but she planned to chase that up very soon. She enjoyed his rugged approach to therapy.
And in the meantime, Lois was investigating Clark and that was that.
****************
“TEMPUS ARRESTED FOR ATTEMPTED BOMBING”
“A SUPERMAN IN OUR MIDST”
The two banner headlines slashed across the front page of the Daily Planet, one at the top and the other half-way down. The Planet had abandoned its usual format for the doubly sensational news, making the page jump out at Lois as she’d scrolled through the microfilm archives at the public library.
Reading both stories piled shock upon shock, until eventually she sagged back in her chair with a slack jaw and just stared at the headlines until they etched themselves on her brain.
Tempus had built his entire Mayoral campaign on the premise that Clark was the forerunner of an alien invasion. Not only that, but he’d done it in such a way – by driving the whole city into a fever pitch of paranoia and fear and encouraging people to arm themselves up to the teeth before they even knew exactly what they were supposed to be defending themselves against – that when he finally revealed that Clark was the alien they feared, people must have been ready to do just about anything to protect themselves.
My God, she thought. If Tempus had succeeded, Clark would very likely be dead by now.
As it was, he’d been forced out into the limelight under the most atrocious and stressful circumstances imaginable.
She scrolled back a few issues, looking for any previous mentions of Superman, but there were none. Why Clark had chosen that day to make his debut as Superman wasn’t clear. There had been the bomb, of course, but if only he’d found a way to deal with that without revealing himself, he wouldn’t have played so directly into Tempus’s hand.
And it was clear to Lois that Superman had been intended as a disguise. Clark wasn’t a natural celebrity; she could see that now that she knew him a little better. He’d wanted to remain anonymous, just as he’d done throughout the rest of his life.
Was this why he’d turned to drugs? To escape from the pressure of fame? Or worse still, to escape from the persecution he’d been subjected to now that people knew he was an alien?
She scrolled forward past the fateful day and found another headline:
“MAN OR SUPERMAN?”
“A profile of Clark Kent, the Daily Planet reporter who shot to fame earlier this week...”
Poor Clark. No doubt he’d hated giving the interview. Of course, being the Planet, the article was even-handed and reasonably non-intrusive, but even so, the potted biography included the fact that he was an orphan twice over and had bounced around the foster system until young adulthood. It even gave brief details of his school and university career. The writer had obviously been trying to demonstrate that Clark was as human as anyone else – further down there was mention of the various social issues Clark had tackled in his stories – but Lois thought that the personal information was still too detailed.
But the biography raised another question. Why hadn’t Clark debuted as Superman when he was younger? Why had he waited until he was...she did a quick calculation...twenty-seven years of age to don tights and a cape and fly around rescuing people? The article made it clear that he’d learned to fly as a teenager, so he’d had the abilities necessary for at least ten years before making his debut. Why the delay?
****************
Dinner at the Whites’ was a big adventure. For the first time, she had to make her own way there and back, and she didn’t even travel by taxi, but took the bus. Okay, so it was a single bus ride and the bus stop was just outside the clinic, but still. Crazy Lois was out in the big city all by herself, and if she’d wanted to, she could have gone anywhere she pleased.
This new freedom was heady stuff, and it carried her through a highly enjoyable and sometimes rumbustious evening with Perry and Alice. Reminiscing about old times at the Planet was good fun. She’d been nervous that dredging up her past might have brought on a panic attack, but her fears appeared to be unfounded as the three of them roared with laughter yet again after Perry had regaled them with yet another story about Andy, the veteran print worker who’d refused to acknowledge the advent of computerised systems.
“What about Clark?” Lois asked when they’d all caught their breath. “You must have some good stories about him, too.”
Perry grinned. “Oh, one or two. I taught that boy everything he knows,” he added proudly.
“You recruited him to the Planet, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yeah,” said Perry. “Still wet behind the ears and with about as much fight in him as a startled jack-rabbit, but I could see he had the potential to be a great reporter.”
“And is he?” she asked, experiencing a small pang of jealousy that Clark should get such a glowing reference from Perry when she couldn’t ever remember him saying anything so complimentary about herself. “A great reporter, I mean.”
Perry’s face clouded over a little. “He will be. It’s taking a little longer than I expected, but he’ll get there. If that boy doesn’t earn himself at least one Kerth before I retire, I’ll eat my hat.”
“You’ll have eaten most everything else by then,” muttered Alice darkly.
Perry rolled his eyes heavenward. “See what I have to put up with?” he said to Lois. “She’d have me on lettuce leaves and carrot juice if I let her. Wouldn’t you, honey?” He shot a sickly-sweet smile at his wife.
“I’m not that delusional,” replied Alice sweetly. “I’d just be content if you’d cut back on those doughnuts you think I don’t know about.”
Perry groaned. “She has spies everywhere,” he told Lois. “She’ll probably try to recruit you, too.”
Lois laughed. “Too late. We’ve already exchanged the secret handshake.”
“Aw, heck!” exclaimed Perry. “Can’t a man enjoy himself once in a while?”
“’Fraid not,” said Lois. “Anyway, getting back to Clark – you say he’s not progressing as well as you expected?”
Perry shrugged. “I guess it’s not easy holding down two jobs.”
No, that didn’t ring true. His answer was too glib, and didn’t fit with the concern that had flitted over his face when she’d asked if Clark was a great reporter. She was almost certain Perry must know about Clark’s drug problem, but he wasn’t giving much away. She tried a different approach. “You were there when he became Superman for the first time, weren’t you?” she said. “What was that like?”
“Incredible,” replied Perry. “He swallowed that bomb just like it was a jelly doughnut. I’d never seen anything like it.”
“And how did you feel?” she prompted. “Seeing someone you thought you knew do that?”
“Surprised as heck,” he said. “I could give you some cock-and-bull story about knowing he was different all along, but the truth is, I was as bowled over as everyone else.”
“Did you ever wonder why he didn’t do it earlier?” she asked. “Why not five, or even ten years earlier?”
