Inside A Lunkhead’s Mind
After Clark's frustrating encounter with Resplendant Man, he climbed the stairs to his apartment.
Inside his mind, Sadness was sitting behind the console. He'd promised to keep watch while the other emotions were in the back of the Headquarters, reenacting a football game Clark had watched the other day.
Sadness pressed a button and Clark fetched the keys from the pocket of his pants. When Clark looked up again, a pacing Lois appeared on screen.
Sadness cleared his throat. "Um, Joy. You should better come here. Lois is in front of Clark's apartment."
Joy interrupted his game and stepped a little closer. "Lois?"
His eyes sparkled with delight and he stared at the screen. But the others hadn't stopped playing yet. Completely mesmerized by Lois' appearance, Joy didn't pay attention to the ball Anger had just tossed for him. The ball hit his head and almost knocked him out. Joy's glasses fell to the floor and his knees buckled underneath him.
Disgust tapped his foot and threw up his hands. "Great, Anger, just great. If you knock Joy out, then who's going to take his place talking to Lois? You? That's sure going to score us some points with her."
Anger already had a heated reply on his lips, but he got distracted as Joy picked up his glasses. He held head and scrambled back to his feet. He swayed as he put his glasses back on.
Meanwhile, Fear pointed at Lois and started to tremble. "She's opening her mouth, she's going to talk to us, boys."
"Where have you been?" Lois asked.
"We need to reply!" Fear grabbed Joy's arm, starting to shake him. The poor Joy still seemed a little out of it and the shaking didn't seem to help his condition any.
Disgust groaned and turned to the only emotion already sitting at the console. "Sadness, do something."
Sadness took a deep breath and pressed the reply button. "Um. Hanging around."
Anger shook his head. "That was lame."
Sadness threw him an angry look. "Think you can do better?"
Right in that moment Joy had managed to collect himself. "Shush, now. She's speaking to us again."
Lois had already switched into full babbling mode. "Perry was right. We need to talk to Superman, and the only way I can ever seem to get his attention is to fall out of a window, which I rather not do right now, or ask you, so here I am."
Anger grumbled and stomped towards the console. "Always about Superman. I'm going to give her a piece of mind about using Clark as her personal messenger boy."
Joy held him back. "Remember, she doesn't know, yet. We didn't tell her."
Anger wasn't convinced. "Well, she should know. I mean, it's kind of obvious. You're not exactly subtle about the torch Clark is carrying for Lois. In either of our guises."
Fear looked alarmed. "You think she knows?"
Anger grumbled something unintelligible. Before he could get into a full-blown rant, Joy laid a hand on his arm.
"If she wants to talk to Superman, we should let her.” He sat down on his chair and gestured for the others to do the same. “Okay, guys. I’m going to switch to Superman mode, now. Fasten your seatbelts, please.”
Anger tapped his fingers on the console. “Don’t you think you’re forgetting something?”
"Darn," Joy said. "We need an excuse and fast. Fear, where are the excuses you were supposed to write down?"
Fear started to tremble. "I... lost them. They got sucked into the long-term memory when I uploaded the fresh memories, yesterday."
Joy covered his eyes with his hands. “You're kidding, right?" Fear shook his head. Joy groaned. "Okay. Brainstorming guys. What could we tell her?”
Sadness shrugged. “Clark needs to fetch something from the mailbox?”
Joy smiled giddily. “That’s great.” He pushed a button.
A sheepish smile appeared on Clark’s lips “Oh gosh, I forgot to get my mail when I was downstairs.”
Lois rolled her eyes in exasperation. “Clark, this is important. You can get your mail later.”
“Uh, oh that backfired,” Anger stated smugly.
“I don’t have time for this,” Joy grumbled.
His hand wandered to a button labeled ‘Random Excuse.’ A collective groan escaped Anger, Fear, Disgust and Sadness. They all covered their eyes with their hands.
“That’s going to be the usual catastrophe,” Fear predicted.
Clark handed Lois his key. “I'm expecting, um, my cheese of the month shipment. Go on in, I'll be right back.”
“Cheese of the month? Seriously?” Disgust rolled his eyes.
“Let’s better not dwell on this one,” Joy said. “Okay, time to change into Superman, boys. Take off your glasses and rip your shirts open, we’re coming in hot.”
Four emotions were changing into Superman, but Disgust shook his head with a vengeance.
“Have you all lost your minds?” he shouted. “I’m not going to take my glasses off for just a short talk. And I’m certainly not going to ruin my shirt again.”
Fear blanched. “But what if she recognizes Clark?”
Disgust snorted. “Because I still wear glasses? That’s ridiculous. Besides, Joy sucks at fixing buttons.”
“Well, I’m not Mom.” Joy said sheepishly.
Disgust wasn’t done yet. “And since we’re already speaking about Mom. Do you really think that Clark will ever get over talking about himself in the third person, if we keep making fools of ourselves?”
“Okay, let’s discuss this later, shall we?” Anger pointed at Lois, who was just turning around to see Superman standing behind her.
Joy pushed another button. “You don’t have to fall out a window, Lois.”
A wonderful smile appeared on her face. The five emotions in the Headquarters leaned back in their chairs. Five groans of satisfaction filled the room.
“God, she’s looking at Clark like that again,” Disgust whispered.
He hoped that neither of the other emotions would see him slip his glasses down his nose. He didn't care whether she recognized Clark or not. He just wanted to get a better look.
The End
Last edited by bakasi; 08/05/21 12:53 AM.
