Rating: A very soft PG
Summary:
Lois, Clark, and a paintbrush. A Valentine's Day story. Spoilers: Probably most of season 4, but I don't think it would spoil everything for a person who hasn't seen it.
Setting: A year or so after the last couple episodes.
AN: This story is my first L&C and I think I managed to capture their voices! Special thanks to my mom who looked it over for those annoying commas. This story was also posted on LJ under my user name Jess_Squirrel for the 12days_of_clois community.
A Fresh Coat of Paint“Guess who?”
Clark felt two soft hands cover his eyes and he froze, paintbrush in midair. He knew that paint was dripping everywhere and he hoped it wasn’t dripping on the new carpet. For a moment, he wondered how to get yellow paint off of white carpet. Perhaps he could melt the paint with his heat vision without melting the carpet? But then that would be breaking his promise to not use his superpowers in the crafting of this room…
“C’mon Clark!” the voice exclaimed impatiently. She moved closer to his ear and her breath tickled the back of his neck. “Can’t you take your mind off the paint for one moment and guess?”
He grinned, knowing exactly who was behind him but choosing to not answer her in the way she expected. “Hmmm…well, you’re certainly not my dad since your voice is too high. My mom hasn’t done this in years and I’m not even sure if she could reach. I’ll have to check next time I see her. Oh! Are you Cat? Her hands might feel like that, but I wouldn’t know. Or maybe you’re an alien from another planet with strange powers…”
“Clark!”
“No, that’s silly. Could you be the
Daily Planet’s top reporter, Lois Lane? I hear she’s ravishingly beautiful and her husband loves her very much.”
Lois removed her hands and poked him in the side. “You forgot to mention that I’m growing.”
Clark squinted and measured her with his hand. “You don’t seem any taller.”
He received a swat on the arm for that one which caused him to chuckle in spite of the danger.
“You know precisely what I mean.”
Carefully he set down the brush and took Lois in his arms. Clark studied her face for a moment before brushing his lips against hers. “I think you grow lovelier every time I look at you, Lois.”
She reached out and caressed his cheek. “Will you think that when I’m fat?”
“Absolutely,” he said with conviction, “because you will always be the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.” He grinned, “Even if you cut your hair and dye it pink. Besides, your ‘growing’ is so special to me…”
“To both of us,” Lois took in a deep breath before she continued. “I’m scared, Clark. I know that I have months to get used to the idea, and I do want a baby. But—“
“I know,” he said gently, “I’m scared too.” Clark slipped his fingers into her hair and gazed into her eyes. “No matter what happens, we’ll get through it together, just like we always have.”
Lois took his hand and placed it on her still-flat stomach. “All of us, together.”
Eyes crinkling into a smile, Clark leaned in close to kiss her. However, he was interrupted by a loud growling noise. He couldn’t resist a small chuckle.
Lois shyly ducked her head. “It seems that baby would rather have lunch than…you know.”
“Baby…” Clark savored the word, loving how it felt on his tongue. It felt so right to say it, to hear it, but also strange. Even though he had always hoped for a wife and family, he still carried a seed of doubt.
Lois broke from the embrace and asked, “What do you say to some lunch? I’ll go make us something if you’ll keep painting.”
Clark grasped her outstretched hand and shook it, “Deal.”
“Thanks,” Lois said and tried to pull away without success.
He looked at her in mock suspicion. “You’re not doing this to get out of painting are you?”
Lois wrinkled her nose in response.
“Because I could always help you. I wouldn’t want you to miss out on something you love.”
“Very funny, Clark.”
Earlier that morning, Lois had confessed how much she hated the smell of paint. She wasn’t entirely enthusiastic about painting; she would much rather watch. Clark told her if she expected him to remodel the room the ‘normal’ way, she had to help.
Lois strolled out of the room leaving Clark to his drippy paintbrush. Before he had a chance to pick it up, she rushed back into the room and gave him a peck on his cheek.
“Happy Valentine’s Day, Clark,” she called over her shoulder as she left.
He watched her retreating figure for a few moments before he realized he was still holding the saturated paintbrush. Quickly, he scanned the carpet and was relieved to discover no damage. Figuring out how to remove paint drips the normal way was not something he wanted to learn.
For a moment Clark just stood there, looking at the can of yellow paint. His childhood room had been painted in the same soft yellow tone. When he and Lois were discussing colors, yellow was the only one they could both agree on. It might have been easier to decide if they had known the sex of their child, but it was too soon to tell.
Clark sighed and began outlining one of the longer walls in yellow paint. Although it would take hours to finish the entire room, he was grateful to have the time to think. The last few weeks had gone by in a hurry. The Lane & Kent team finished up a long series on a certain group of terrorists that had taken weeks to research and write. In the middle of all the excitement, their lives had changed forever.
After handing in the last article yesterday, the Chief ordered them to take a few days off. Perry didn’t know what had happened; all he knew was the fact that Lois hadn’t been feeling well. Actually, no one else knew about the baby since they had decided to keep it to themselves. It was their own special secret, and they were both experts in the keeping secrets department.
It would be months before the nursery would actually be needed. They had decided to start working as soon as they could. One could never tell when Superman might be needed. Clark was thankful that today seemed to be a very uneventful day for the man in the cape.
He stood back and surveyed his work. “Not bad,” Clark said to himself. As he reached for the roller, his sensitive ears picked up muttering from the kitchen. Apparently Lois was having troubles with lunch. He grinned, knowing that Lois still had the occasional bad luck in the kitchen.
I only hope she doesn’t burn the house down, he thought to himself.
Dipping the roller into the paint, he glanced around the empty room. It hadn’t served a purpose before; it was simply the extra room. Now it was the baby’s room.
The baby’s room… Clark thought to himself with joy.
An idea struck him when he was half-way finished with the wall. Clark paused in mid-roll and turned to look at the wall behind him. It certainly was an intriguing idea… However, he wasn’t sure about Lois’s view of Valentine’s Day. He could almost hear her say that it was “just another excuse to buy flowers and get fat on candy”.
He pondered for a moment before he decided to act on the idea. Taking the paintbrush, he left the roller in the pan and went to the other wall. Quickly, but not super-quickly, he began to paint.
~*~Lois muttered to herself in the kitchen, looking despairingly at her best tablecloth. The meal preparations had been going so well—almost done, in fact—but then…she tripped. And now the tablecloth was in a horrible state. She sighed, rolled it up, and tossed it in the general direction of the laundry room. Putting her hands over her eyes she hoped that the stains would come out. Lois didn’t want to explain to Martha what had happened to her antique gift.
“Plan B, Plan B…what’s Plan B?” she asked aloud. Willing her mind to think, she lowered her hands and cast her eyes about the room. At first, nothing seemed to provide an answer to her current predicament. But then her gaze rested on a little basket sitting on the counter.
Puzzled, Lois studied the basket and wondered how it appeared in her kitchen. Eventually she gave up, deciding that it must have appeared during the last few weeks. It wasn’t surprising that she would not recall bringing home a basket, considering how chaotic her recent days had been.
“Oh Lois, how dumb can you be? Of course! The basket is Plan B!”
She ran to her refrigerator and studied the contents. “It’s not exactly the romantic lunch you were planning, but it’ll have to do,” she said quietly. Quickly, Lois pulled out the fixings for lunch, put it together, and laid her creations into the basket.
Satisfied that her lunch was saved, she glanced outside and was pleased to note the sun coming out from behind the clouds.
It’s turning into a perfect day, Lois thought with a smile.
“Clark?” she called from the bottom of the stairs. “Lunch is ready.”
“Um…Lois, could you come up here?”
“Alright,” a perplexed Lois answered.
He was waiting for her in the doorway of the baby’s room, trying to hold back a grin.
“What?”
“Oh…nothing.”
“Nice try, Smallville. I can tell something’s going on—you look like the cat who ate the canary.”
Clark obviously gave up trying not to grin and turned the full power of his smile on her. “Come here,” he said reaching out for her hands, “close your eyes.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, she slipped her hands into his and shut her eyes. “You’re the only person in the world who’s allowed to do this to me.”
“I know,” Clark said, amused.
Without further ado, he led her into the room and turned her to the left. Clark dropped her hands and Lois felt him stand beside her. “Open your eyes,” he said gently.
Lois did as she was told and gave a small gasp of surprise. On the tan wall before her was a large yellow heart fashioned perfectly. Inside the heart was written “Lois + Clark = Love” in his flowing cursive handwriting.
“I didn’t have time to find a tree…do you like it?”
She nodded, “I feel almost like I’m back in high school…but no one has ever done this for me.”
“I’ll admit that I’ve never made one either. But wait, there’s one more thing.” Clark left her for a pile of tarps in the corner of the room. Moving a tarp aside, he carefully extracted a bouquet of red roses.
“Now before you say that Valentine’s Day is just another frivolous holiday, I need to tell you I love the chance to spoil you.”
Lois smiled and held up a hand to stop him. “I have nothing against Valentine’s Day—I’d just like to skip the ‘getting sick on chocolate part’. And…I do love being spoiled by my husband.” She reached out for the roses and continued, “I’ll put these in water…would you mind drying out the room?”
Clark raised his eyebrows at her. “Wouldn’t that be breaking the agreement?”
“Not…exactly.”
“I see.”
“Oh, and put down a blanket.”
“What?”
“Just do it, Clark!” she exclaimed as she left the room.
A few moments later she returned, laden with the basket and a candle.
“What’s all this? A picnic?” Clark asked, surprised.
“I thought that—well what I mean is…do you like picnics?”
“Lois, I grew up in the country.”
“Oh, right. Would you take this?” she asked holding out the basket.
“Sure,” Clark said, and placed it on the blanket. He gestured toward the finished walls of the nursery and asked, “What do you think of the room?”
Lois turned around to look at his progress. One of the longer walls had been completed along with the shorter one that had the room’s only window. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine what it would look like when they had finished everything. In her mind’s eye, she saw where the crib and the little dresser would go. She couldn’t quite imagine the rocking chair or the diaper changing place. Eventually they would pick out the remaining pieces of furniture the room required.
In the hallway, the tiny dresser stood waiting to be moved. During one of their recent lunch breaks, Lois had seen the little dresser in a store window and was immediately attracted to it. The dresser was about three feet high and made out of honey colored wood. When Clark had told her that his old crib was made of the same tone of wood, Lois knew it was the one. Thankfully, Clark knew Martha had saved the crib and that it rested in the attic of the Kent’s farmhouse. The thought of their child sleeping in the same crib his or her father did seemed so extraordinary to her.
Clark’s gentle voice broke into her musings. “Lois? What do you think?”
She smiled, “It’s lovely, Clark. I really love the yellow—it reminds me of sunshine.”
“I was just thinking that.”
“And I see you left some painting for me to do.”
“You can’t let me have
all the fun.” He gestured toward the heart, “Do you want to cover it up?”
She pondered for a moment before deciding. “I’d rather paint around it for now. We can always go over it later.”
Clark nodded and sat down on the blanket. A moment later he tugged Lois into his lap and hugged her. “This day is perfect.”
Lois nodded and enjoyed his arms around her for a minute before she said anything. “If you don’t mind lighting the candle, Clark, I’ll tell you what I brought.”
An hour later, the remains of the picnic had been packed away and placed into the basket. The candle continued to burn where they’d left it while Lois and Clark finished up the last wall. They laughed, bantered, and shared quite a few kisses while they worked. It wasn’t long before their job was completed, and everything put away.
Clark finished moving the little dresser into the room and positioned it carefully against a wall. “What do you think?”
“It needs something…”
He could almost see the wheels turning in her head while she was thinking. Watching her face light up when an idea hit her always intrigued him.
“Wait here.”
Patiently, or rather semi-patiently he waited for her to return. Clark used his super-hearing to track her movement to their bedroom. A moment later she burst into the room and set something on the dresser.
“What do you think?”
It’s the bear, he realized. The little black bear he had won for Lois in Smallville. She had kept it in her room ever since, most recently on her beside table.
“It can’t be baby’s room without it.”
“I love it…and you.” Clark drew her into a backwards embrace and kissed the top of her head.
“Do you think we’re ready for this?”
“Lois,” he began, “the most important thing I have learned since I met you is this. Anything is possible when we face it together.”
He felt her totally relaxed against him before she answered. “I know, but sometimes it takes a fresh coat of paint to help remind me.”
“Me too. Have I told you that I’ve never been happier? Except on our last wedding day, that was one of the best days of my life.”
In reply Lois turned and entwined her fingers in his hair. A moment later she kissed him deeply, feeling totally and utterly content.
The End
