She couldn’t let this go. Jack Mackenzie could leave – move beyond her reach – at any time. Then, the decision would be taken out of her hands.
She had to act now. She had to find some answers to the horde of questions relentlessly tapping at her brain. Perhaps then she would find a measure of peace. Perhaps then she could go back to Metropolis and attempt to resurrect her career. Perhaps then…
She felt the table shift a little and sensed movement around her. Strong arms lifted her and held her against a broad body. She knew she should protest, but sleep lured her exhausted body and overloaded mind towards nothingness.
“It’s OK, Lois.” It was Clark’s voice, very close. “You’re tired. We’ll take you to the spare room where you can rest.”
Lois knew she should open her eyes. She should demand that he put her down and let her drive away.
But her final reserves of energy were gone. She snuggled closer into his chest and succumbed to the captivating lure of oblivion.
Chapter 2
The sunlight was fading when Lois awoke. She sat up slowly, surveying her surroundings. The walls were painted the palest blue. The curtains were blue and white gingham and held open with wide burgundy ribbons. Beyond the curtains, she could see the expanse of fields.
Next to her bed was a small nightstand, covered with a cloth embroidered with flowers. Her watch was there, alongside a lamp and a flashlight.
She hadn’t got to the hotel. She must have fallen asleep, here, at the Kents’ kitchen table. Seeing her handbag and suitcase positioned against the wall, she leapt from the bed, snatched her handbag, and rifled through it. Nothing was missing. Nothing had been touched.
She jumped to the door and turned the knob. It opened easily. It had no locking device. Two aromas floated up the stairs, teasing her nostrils. Bacon… and coffee!
Lois closed the door and sat on the bed, feeling a mix of disgust and relief. Lois Lane walked – sometimes ran – into dangerous situations, but she never, ever let down her guard.
This time, she had. She’d allowed herself to be defenceless as she’d slept in the house of strangers.
But, as far as she could tell, these strangers hadn’t taken advantage of her vulnerability.
She felt her cheeks heat a little, wondering what they must think of her. She checked her watch. Almost seven o’clock. She’d slept for over two hours!
She noticed a fluffy mauve towel on the dresser with a piece of paper folded on top of it. The keys to the rental car lay next to the towel.
Lois crossed the room and picked up the piece of paper. It read: You’ve had a lovely long sleep. The bathroom is the door to the left of yours. There’s plenty of hot water. Have a long shower, then come down for breakfast. Love, Martha.
Breakfast?
Exactly how long had she slept?
Lois crossed to the window and looked out. She could see a green tractor moving along a straight row in a field. To its left, the grass was cut, to the right it was standing tall, billowing in the breeze. Was that Clark?
The last thing she could remember was being held against a broad chest. That, and a feeling of complete security.
It had to have been Clark who had carried her up the stairs, removed her shoes, and placed her in the bed.
How should she feel about that? Annoyed? Grateful? Uneasy? Embarrassed?
She looked out of the window again. The distant tractor reached the end of the field, made a wide, sweeping turn, and set out along the next row.
Lois closed her eyes and tried to visualise the map. Which way was north? She bundled together her memories of the map, the house, and the surrounding fields, and concluded that her window was facing north. The sun was to her right – in the east.
She had slept for almost fifteen hours!
Lois couldn’t remember ever sleeping for that long. She’d been a terrible imposition on Martha and Clark. Although she did vaguely remember an invitation to stay. And Martha’s note didn’t sound as if she resented uninvited guests appearing in her kitchen, falling asleep at her table, and needing to be carried to bed.
Lois looked down on the surrounding country. There was only one other house in view, and it was little more than a speck in the distance. To her right, about fifty yards from the house was the side of a large red barn with a wooden cabin tucked behind it. Below her was a garden, the plants set out in neat rows. There were a lot less flowers than in the front garden. Maybe it was vegetables?
To the left, she could see the front of the rental car, parked alongside a blue car.
In the field, the tractor was halfway along another row.
Did Clark find it boring? What did he think about as he drove up and down those endless rows?
Lois hauled her suitcase onto the bed and began rummaging through the hastily packed contents. As she had thrown in her clothes, she had convinced herself that finding Jack Mackenzie would solve all her problems and take away the pain.
That had been patently illogical.
He was due to return today.
That fact solved nothing. Indeed, it intensified the need for decisions.
Did she want to meet him?
Could she just walk away and pretend she didn’t know? Lois sighed. She had never been able to control her rampant curiosity.
Would meeting him give her the peace she needed to move on and attempt to rebuild her life?
Was it possible to meet him and remain anonymous?
That was preferable to other options. She wasn’t ready to deal with the complications of Jack Mackenzie knowing her. It would be like letting the genie out of the bottle, and she would have no control over what happened next.
What should she do now?
She read Martha’s note again. A shower to wash away the travel grime was exactly what she needed. And breakfast. Her stomach was gnawing at her insides. And coffee. She really needed coffee.
Lois pulled a favourite pair of jeans, a blue tee-shirt, and a light sweater from her suitcase. Then, gathering her clothes and the towel, she went in search of the bathroom, still no closer to finding answers to the vortex of questions swirling through her brain.
~~~~
“Lois!” Martha greeted, turning from a sizzling pan on the stovetop. “You look so much better this morning.”
“Good morning, Mrs Kent,” Lois said. “I can’t believe I slept all night. I’m sorry for causing you so much trouble.”
“No trouble at all,” Martha said. “We love having you. And please, call me ‘Martha’.”
“Thank you, Martha,” Lois said, inhaling deeply as the aroma from the pan reminded her of exactly how little she had eaten in the past twenty-four hours. “And thank you for looking after me yesterday.”
“You’re welcome, honey,” Martha said. “I’m so glad you stopped at our gate. You must be hungry. I’ll just finish this for Clark and take it out to him, then I’ll cook some breakfast for us.”
“I could take it out to him,” Lois offered.
“Would you?” Martha said as she placed six slices of thick bread on a board. “That would be a wonderful help.”
“Of course. Is he in the green tractor I saw out of my window?”
“Yes. He’s slashing the north field for hay.” Martha flipped all three eggs and then turned back to the table to butter the bread. “Have you thought any more about finding your young man?” she asked casually.
There was nothing in Martha’s question to indicate she knew the ‘young man’ was Jack Mackenzie. “He’s not my young man,” Lois said quickly. “He’s just… he’s just someone I thought I wanted to find.”
Martha nodded. “Have you decided what you are going to do?”
“I don’t know… I think if I went home without seeing him, I would always wonder.”
“Yes,” Martha said. “I think you should try to find the answers. Talk it out with him. Find out where you stand… what he wants. You’ve travelled such a long way. And completely exhausted yourself.”
“It’s not… it’s not what you think.”
Martha put rashers of crispy bacon on the bread. “Do you have any plans for today?”
“I suppose I should -”
“I have a suggestion.”
“You do?”
“There are a ton of tomatoes waiting to be canned,” Martha said, gesturing through the back window. “Maybe you wouldn’t mind helping me while you think things through.”
“I don’t know much about cooking. It’s not something I do.”
“No one knows without being shown,” Martha said.
Mindless activity – such as canning tomatoes, whatever that entailed – was surprisingly appealing. It would give her time – a couple of hours to decide if she should stay and meet Jack or leave. Perhaps it would be possible to meet him without him knowing she was anyone other than the Kents’ house guest. “OK,” Lois said, trying to inject some enthusiasm into her reply.
“Thank you, honey,” Martha said with a smile. “I’d really appreciate the help.”
Martha placed an egg on each of the three sandwiches, put the bread on top, and then loaded them into a small plastic container. “Clark has been out there since five-thirty so he’s going to be ready for this.” She handed the container to Lois and added a large, lidded cup.
Lois breathed in the coffee aroma, and her stomach responded. She was starving.
“Can you carry all that?” Martha asked.
“Yes. It’s fine.”
Martha crossed the long kitchen to the back door and opened it. “Thanks, honey,” she said. “I’ll start on our breakfast.”
Lois walked across the porch, down the steps and through the back garden towards the tractor, which was coming towards her. It reached the fence before she did and stopped. Clark jumped down and approached her with long, easy strides. When he arrived at the fence, he placed his hands on a post and swung over with a lithe movement. He was smiling as came closer.
“Good morning, Lois,” he said. “How are you feeling now?”
Lois handed him the sandwich container and mug. “Better,” she said. “Thanks to you and your mom.”
“We didn’t do much,” he said. “Just allowed you to rest.”
“Fifteen hours!” she said. “When I woke up and saw it was almost seven o’clock, I thought it was evening.”
Clark laughed. “Thanks for bringing my breakfast,” he said.
“You’re welcome.”
He lifted the top sandwich from the box.
“Clark?”
His eyes shot into hers, deep and brown and soft, just as she had remembered them. “Yes?”
“Thank you for your discretion,” Lois said. “I appreciate you not telling Martha I came looking for Jack Mackenzie.”
“It’s not my business.” Clark took a sip from his coffee. “Have you decided if you want to see him?”
Had she?
“Sorry,” he said quickly. “That’s none of my business either.”
“I haven’t had much time to think this morning.”
“You’re welcome to stay as long as you like.”
“Martha asked me to help with the tomatoes today.”
Clark seemed genuinely pleased at that news. “That’s a great idea,” he said. “You’ll stay?”
Lois nodded.
“Thank you.”
His appreciation was low and balmy, setting off a few hunger pangs in her stomach. “You’re welcome,” she said.
“You have some time. Punctuality isn’t Jack’s strongest point. I doubt he’ll be here until mid-afternoon.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Lois said, turning back to the house. “Enjoy your breakfast.”
~~~~
Clark leaned against the back tractor tyre and ate his breakfast. His thoughts were not on food, but on Lois Lane.
She was the most intriguing woman he had ever met.
Intriguing. Fascinating. Captivating.
Mysterious. Distant. Brilliant.
Strong. Vulnerable.
And beautiful. So very beautiful.
But…
She had come to Smallville looking for Jack Mackenzie, and Clark had spent most of the morning trying to deduce possible reasons.
Most likely it seemed Lois and Jack had been together as a couple, broken up, and now Lois was having second thoughts.
Clark slowly shook his head. Jack was a nice kid, but Clark could not imagine him with someone like Lois. And that was the Lois he’d seen here – lost and confused and obviously distressed. The Lois Lane he imagined – the capable, talented, tenacious reporter for The Daily Planet – made it even more incongruous that she would be with Jack.
But now, she was looking for him.
Why?
A thought that had lurked around the edges of his mind leapt onto centre stage.
What if Lois had discovered she was pregnant? With Jack’s child?
Clark swallowed roughly. Jack was twenty-two, but sometimes he seemed more like a teenager. He was not ready for fatherhood.
“Aw, Lois,” he murmured.
As he’d told her, it was not his business. But he was concerned. Far more concerned than he had any right to be.
Jack had knocked on the door asking for work a bit over two months ago. If he had just broken up with Lois, and then she’d discovered she was pregnant, the timing was possible.
Clark did have a second, marginally preferable scenario.
Lois could be following a lead for a story. Clark had read enough Lois Lane stories to know she was an investigative reporter. She’d come all this way to find Jack – it had to be something big.
How would it affect the farm?
More importantly, how would it affect his mother?
To get to where she was in her career, Lois had had to be ruthless. If she were investigating Jack and she found something to publish, Clark doubted she would let a simple Kansas farmer and his mother get in the way of her story.
It would be asking too much.
But he wondered what sort of investigation would bring her to tears. Tears of frustration, maybe, but not the body-wrenching sobs he had heard from his tractor yesterday.
Those tears seemed to be a response to heartache.
Heartache caused by Jack?
Clark climbed into the tractor, put the coffee cup between his knees, and started the motor to continue driving row after row, paddock after paddock.
His world was slow and repetitive and conventional. Tedious even.
Her world was fast-paced and modern and dynamic and exciting.
She was – in every way possible – out of his reach.
But that knowledge did nothing to still his heart or silence its assertion that Lois Lane was exactly the woman he had been waiting for his entire life.
~~~~
“Who’s Bess?” Lois asked a few minutes after she and Martha had sat down behind two steaming plates loaded with bacon, eggs, tomatoes, and mushrooms.
Martha smiled, and there was a twinkle in her eye as she answered. “Bess has been the love of Clark’s life for a long time.”
“Is she Clark’s wife?”
“Oh no,” Martha said. “Clark isn’t married.”
“Bess is his girlfriend?”
Martha shook her head. “Bess is Clark’s cow,” she said. “She has helped him through some really tough times.”
A cow? A cow had helped Clark through tough times? “She’s pregnant?”
“Yes. About to calve. Any day now.”
“Is Clark worried about her?”
“Not worried exactly. But he’s watching her pretty closely.”
“She means a lot to him?”
Martha nodded slowly. “She means more to him than most people would be able to understand.”
Lois certainly didn’t understand it. “A cow?” she said, trying to suppress the scepticism in her tone. “Don’t you have a farm? Don’t you have lots of animals?”
“Yes, we do,” Martha said as she lathered golden butter on her bread. “There are the animals – they all get the best care we can give them. Then there are the special ones – the favourites. And then there’s Bess.”
“Why is she so special?”
“I used to milk my cow, Winnie, every day. When Clark was twelve, we struck a deal. Winnie’s next heifer calf would be his, and once the calf was grown and ready to milk, Clark would take over the job.”
“Bess was born?” Lois said, no closer to understanding how a cow could mean so much.
“It wasn’t that simple,” Martha said. “Winnie’s next two calves were bull calves. Then she had a stillborn heifer calf. Then, finally, the heifer calf we’d been waiting for arrived. Bess. Clark was sixteen by then. I think he loved her from the moment he saw her.”
Lois hadn’t known any sixteen-year-old boys who were enamoured by a cow. “She must be special,” she said, hoping her lack of comprehension wasn’t too obvious. “He waited a long time for her.”
“Clark never gave up hope,” Martha said with a quiet smile. “And yes, Bess is very special.”
They finished breakfast and cleared the table. Then Martha gave Lois a bucket, and together, they went to the back garden.
Tomato picking, as Lois discovered over the next hour, was a lot more physical than she’d imagined. Very soon, all the bending, stretching, and squatting started to feel like a yoga class. Eventually, they took their full buckets back to the kitchen and spent the rest of the morning cleaning, slicing, and roasting tomatoes.
And talking, too.
Martha talked about the farm, some of the animals, some of the times when extremes in the weather had made everything more difficult. She talked about vegetable varieties she grew. She talked about Winnie, her cow. She mentioned Clark occasionally, but never as the focus of the story.
But she didn’t mention Clark’s father. Or her husband. Or whether they were the same man.
Martha wore a simple gold wedding band. Where was the man who had given her that ring?
Lois glanced around the kitchen. On the mantlepiece, there were three photos – a tractor, a baby cow, and a garden of flowers.
If Martha’s husband had died, why were there no photos?
If he’d left, why was she still wearing his ring?
She’d said she’d lived in this house – and therefore, the local community – for almost forty years. Yet, it seemed to Lois that she was lonely.
Where were her friends? Her extended family? Did she have any other children?
“Well done, Lois,” Martha said as she sprinkled salt and pepper over the tomatoes and placed the final tray in the oven. “Next job is Clark’s lunch.”
“I can take it to him,” Lois offered, hoping she didn’t sound too eager.
“It’ll be a bit of a walk,” Martha said. “He’ll be in the far field by now.”
“I would like a walk after being in the kitchen all morning. Maybe we could both go.”
Martha considered for a moment and then said, “I’ll stay here and prepare the canning jars so we can get straight onto that after lunch.” She looked at Lois. “I can pack enough for both you and Clark so you can have a picnic under the trees.”
Great food. Peaceful fields. Warm sun. It sounded good. Except…
“Isn’t Clark busy?” Lois asked.
“Yes,” Martha said. “But he needs a break. If you take just his lunch, he’ll keep working while he eats. But if you’re eating too, he’ll have to stop.”
“OK,” Lois agreed. “Thanks, Martha.”
Her reply was cut off by the phone, and Martha crossed the kitchen to answer it. “Martha Kent.”
Lois took the knives and cutting boards to the sink and began to wash them.
“Do you know when you’ll be back?” Martha said into the phone.
Lois put the clean boards on the drainer.
“OK. I’ll tell Clark,” Martha said with a sigh. “Bye.”
Lois turned from the sink as Martha replaced the phone. “Anything wrong?” Lois asked.
“That was Jack,” Martha said. “He is Clark’s farmhand. He was supposed to be away for a couple days, but he’s been gone for over a week. We were expecting him to return today, but now he says he doesn’t know when he’ll be back.”
Lois turned back to the sink, mostly to give herself some space to absorb this new information. “Did he say why he was delayed?” she asked, trying to keep her tone casual.
“He said it was personal.”
“Do you have any ideas? Did he say anything before he left?”
“No. He announced rather suddenly that he had something he needed to do and left the next day.”
“You sound disappointed. Do you like him?”
Martha took out a large frying pan and set it to warm on the stovetop. “Yes, I like him,” she said. “He’s a good worker, eager to learn, cheery…”
“But?”
“I was going to say he’s not very reliable, but he is in the sense that when Clark gives him a job, he does it well. After just a few days, Clark didn’t feel he needed to check everything Jack did. But Jack knows Clark needs him here now, and he keeps delaying his return.”
“Do you think he will come back?”
“I hope so,” Martha said. “He knows harvest is a busy time.”
Martha’s mood had dipped noticeably. Lois left the sink and approached her. “Are you worried about Clark?”
Martha nodded. “There is so much to do. If Jack were here, he could do the tractor work, which would leave Clark free to keep up with everything else.”
Lois collected the containers from the table. With Jack’s return no longer imminent, there was nothing to keep her here. And yet… “Would it help if I stayed another day?” she offered. “I probably can’t do much to help Clark, but I can help you.”
Martha paused from lunch preparations. “That would be wonderful,” she said. “But can you spare the time? What about the young man you’re looking for?”
“I need time to think,” Lois said. That was true. But also true was that she felt strangely disinclined to leave. “It’s peaceful here. Different than my life in Metropolis. And you’ve been so good to me. I’d like to help if I can.”
“Thank you, Lois,” Martha said with a smile. “I know Clark is concerned that I’m too busy and I worry about things. He’ll be so pleased you can stay.”
Martha made cheese omelettes and put them into the buns that had been cooling on the bench. She packed them into a cane basket and added some tomatoes, a large bunch of grapes, two apples, and several slabs of fruit cake. Then came a bottle of lemonade and two cups.
“Would you please tell Clark that Jack won’t be here today?” Martha said as she folded a blanket and laid it on top of the basket.
“Or course. Will he be disappointed?”
“A little. Although he’s probably already given up on some of his plans for this fall. He was hoping to get the new barn finished before winter, but that won’t happen now.”
“Oh,” Lois said. “That’s a shame.”
Martha handed Lois the basket. “See if you can keep Clark at lunch for at least twenty minutes.”
“I hardly know him,” Lois said. “What should I talk about?”
“Do you know anything about farming?”
Lois shook her head. “Not one thing.”
“Good,” Martha said. “Ask him questions about the farm. Ask anything that interests you. Or you could tell him about your life in Metropolis.”
“OK.” Lois stepped through the door to be greeted by the warm sunshine. As she walked through the garden, she felt her mood lift with anticipation.
Picnics were fun. They were one of the many things that had fallen away in her all-consuming obsession to become the best reporter in the world. Looking back, she realised that at some point, she had stopped living and accepted that merely existing would be enough.
It wasn’t.
A picnic in the sunshine seemed symbolic of a more straightforward life. Slower, simpler, more natural. Yet also more real, more genuine.
Home-made food, sunshine, taking time out from the morning’s work… it felt like a balm to her tormented soul.
~~~~
Clark had been watching the back door of the farmhouse for over an hour. It was approaching lunchtime, but it wasn’t hunger that sparked his interest.
Then he saw her come through the back door, basket in hand, and his spirits soared. He shut off the tractor engine, jumped down from the seat, accessed the motor and removed a shield screw, bent it to seventy degrees, gathered up his jacket, and flew to the orchard, which was located between the house and the fields.
He used the final few seconds to wipe his hands on his jeans and run his fingers through his hair. He lowered his glasses, watching her approach and timing his move so as not to startle her.
He strode out of the orchard when Lois was twenty yards away. “Lois,” he called, waving in her direction.
“Hi, Clark,” she responded.
He tilted his head enough to look over his glasses and check the contents of the basket. Yep, as he’d hoped, there was enough to two.
“Martha is watching the tomatoes,” Lois said as she neared him. “She suggested we eat lunch together because the weather is so good.”
He held up the bent screw. “I need to go to the barn to replace this part,” he said. “I’m glad I saved you the long trek to the far field.” He pointed to a log, smoothed out by time, and placed at a convenient distance from a broad tree trunk that functioned as back support. He folded his jacket and put it on the log, straightening its creases with a brisk sweep. “Would you like to sit here?”
“Thanks.” Lois smiled at him, causing his heart to somersault a few times as she sat down and began to unpack their lunch.
Clark sat next to her – careful to get near enough for comfortable conversation but not close enough to crowd her.
Lois handed him an omelette inside a bun. Clark took a bite, wishing he’d had the forethought to plan topics of conversation.
She busied herself with pouring the lemonade.
Silence fell.
Clark thought of a series of questions and dismissed each one as being banal. Or intrusive. Or insensitive.
The gap between him and Lois yawned wide and impassable.
She handed him one of the cups.
“Thanks,” he said, his voice sounding dry and strangled.
Lois turned a little more towards him, and he desperately hoped she was about to open a conversation. “What is the most important thing to remember on a farm?” she asked.
Last edited by Female Hawk; 05/20/24 04:26 AM.
