He's looking at me again. I can feel it. I haven't checked, but I imagine those beautiful, gentle eyes staring at me full of disappointment and it kills me just a little more; I can't bear to see it.
Wow. You make Clark's gaze feel as if it is a physical thing, touching Lois like a soft hand. As readers, we know that it
is touching her like a soft hand. But Lois can only feel reproach and disillusionment. Clark is not going to respect her any more.
I've been ignoring his attempts to "talk about it' for at least ten minutes now, but the pitiful sounds coming from him are only getting more annoying. After he heaves another pathetic sigh, I slap my papers down on the table and turn to him, crossing my arms.
“What?” I bark. My sudden outburst startles him and I feel just a teeny, tiny bit bad about snapping at him.
Lois is going to pieces, so she enwraps herself in a hard shell of anger, like a shellfish, to stop her soft innards from spilling all over the place. But Clark's sighs keep penetrating her cover and to protect herself she explodes.
“Are you…okay,” he asks tentatively.
“I'm fine.”
“Lois, your heart rate is one hundred fifty beats per minute sitting down. That's not fine.”
It's not; I know it's not, but it doesn't matter. I feel humiliated and refuse to discuss this with him. I look away from him and start shuffling the papers again, trying to avoid his sympathy. “I don't want to talk about it.”
I hear him get up and successfully ignore him until I feel his hands rest on my shoulders. “Then don't,” he says. “Just relax.”
I love it. He just worries about her and wants to comfort her. Like we knew he would. And he does comfort her, too, and she feels safe and protected, so she finally spills what has been bothering her.
I cling to the idea that Clark knows my darkest secrets and even after finding out what a fool I am, he's still here. He knows it, yet he hasn't run away from me. It's this fact that finally draws the confession from my lips.
“I knew,” I softly admit. “Even before I married him, I knew he would cheat on me.”
How despicable she feels when she tells him this. But it is good to finally confide in someone, so she keeps talking.
“The first time I suspected he slept with another woman after our marriage, I was devastated. Then I went ballistic and Lex got his first real dose of Lane fury. I think it shocked him a little. My tantrum made me feel better, but I didn't really change anything. Right from the beginning, Lex told me that the pursuit of pleasure drives him and I had no delusions that our marriage would make him a monogamous man. I learned from my father that men aren't honest when it comes to sex and they never stay faithful.”
Oh, how sad. But let me tell you, Brenda, this is the first thing Lois has said that makes her marriage make sense to me. So many women marry men who resemble their fathers. So many daughters of destructive fathers marry destructive men themselves. Lois is the daughter of a philanderer, so she married a philanderer. Of course, Lex has a lot more than just philandering to answer for!
“I gave up the idea that love existed a long time ago,” I explain, “so I settled for security.”
But this is weird. How could Lois believe that Lex would give her security? Did her father give her mother security? Sam cheated on Ellen, grew increasingly tired of her, divorced her, and made her sink ever deeper into alcoholism. Is that security?
“But when it comes to romantic relationships … well, let's just say that I put up with Lex's behavior because my experiences have made me a cynic.”
Maybe this comes closer to the truth. Lois married Lex not because she expected him to bring her security, but because marriage is the required thing to do. Lois wanted to live up to some sort of expectations - perhaps her perceived expectations of society and of everyone around her - so she did the required thing, she got married. But because she was a cynic, she
knew that Lex would not give her love or fidelity. And she probably knew that he wouldn't give her security, either. Still, she also knew that Lex was a 'catch', since he was the third richest man in the world, and practically every woman in the world would envy her for landing herself such a prize. That was a sufficiently good reason for her to marry him, probably.
Speaking of expectations, however: Lois certainly 'knew' that a woman is expected to keep her husband faithful to her. If he cheats on her it is her fault, because she hasn't been good enough as a wife. And if she stays with him even though he cheats on her, then she is a woman of no self-respect, and she only deserves contempt. That's why Lois expects Clark to despise her.
Lois so needed to be hugged right here! And I loved Clark for hugging her and setting her straight about his opinion of her:
His gentle tone cracks my detached façade and tears I didn't expect slip down my cheeks. “I can't … your opinion matters so much to me, Clark. It's killing me to know that you see me as less now.”
He wraps his arms around my shoulders and pulls me into a gentle embrace against his chest. “You're my friend and I care about you,” he whispers intently into my hair. “None of this changes my opinion of you; you're strong, brilliant, beautiful … pig-headed.”
I snort with laughter and he hugs me tighter. “Nothing Luthor does will ever make me see anything but the most amazing woman I've ever met.”
Looking forward to the next part!
Ann
.
. I've been writing nice Sams too long, I think, because it almost caught me off guard when she said he'd been like that.
In a non-adulterous way, but they're working on getting rid of the adultery angle.
