Thanks - as always - to Nancy, Beth, Alisha and Queenie.
More family drama headed my way /sigh/. So be gentle - I can't take much today...
Last time:
Pete nodded, giving her a big hug as he got ready to leave. "Congrats, Lolo."
She smacked him. "You know better than that."
"Sorry." He grinned.
"No, you're not."
"You're right."
"Can we at least go to Parsons or Independence or something if we go?" Lois asked him.
Pete nodded. "Sure."
"Thanks."
Another quick hug and a wave to Clark and he left.
"Which would you rather do?" she asked him quietly, walking into the kitchen, beginning to unpack her purchases.
He followed her and started looking through the bags. "I don't care. What about you? What do you want to do?"
Lois tried to hold back the tears as she stuck the silverware holder in a drawer. "Make love," she mumbled. That was what she really wanted to do. It wasn't going to happen, but that was what she wanted.
"What did you say?"
Chapter 14
Lois looked up, meeting Clark's wide eyes with her own. "What?" she asked.
"What did you say?"
She shrugged. "Nothing."
"No. It wasn't nothing. You said 'make love'. Didn't you?"
Lois looked at him, tears shining in her eyes. "So?" she said defiantly. "You're my husband. We just moved into our first house together. Does it really surprise you that I want to make love? That I want you to want to?"
Clark sighed. "I want to remember," he said quietly.
Lois moved towards him, stopping when she was inches from him. She rested her hand on his chest. "Make love to me," she whispered. "Maybe that's what you need to jog your memory."
He gulped as she ran her hand down his chest, over his stomach, before sliding her arms around his waist. His arms automatically went around her. "I don't know," he whispered back. "Are you sure that's what you want? To be with me even if I don't remember? I care about you, I know that but..." His fingers brushed against her cheek.
"Lois? Clark?" A knock on the screen door interrupted them.
Lois released him and took a step back. "Come in," she called, turning back to the bags on the counter.
Martha walked in. "Hey, you went shopping!"
Clark leaned against the counter. "I went to play basketball with Pete and Josh. Lois was asleep when I left but when we got back..." He gestured around them. "We now have stuff."
Martha laughed. "Well, I wanted to see what sounded good to Lois for dinner."
Clark glanced at her, but she was too busy unloading the plates into the sink. "Actually, Pete asked if we wanted to go out with him and Abby tonight, but we said we'd have to check with you first – see what you had planned for dinner and all that."
Martha breathed a sigh of relief. "It actually would be okay with me. Dad and I had a long day, longer than expected. I was hoping that you guys would be up for cold cuts for dinner, but I knew Dad would expect something more if we were having 'company'." She used finger quotes and rolled her eyes. "Like you guys are company. I'm really not up for cooking though."
"Don't worry about us, Martha," Lois said, moving the box to the table. "We'll be fine."
Martha caught her hand as she walked by. "I didn't get to see these last night, not really." She looked at Lois' wedding set. "It looks like..."
Lois nodded. "Clark said it reminded him of something from his birth family. He never told me what, said he'd tell me later but..."
"It looks like the El family crest, a bit at least," Martha told her. She looked at Clark. "Have you shown her the ship and the globe?"
Clark shrugged. "What ship? What globe? Where are they?"
Martha sighed. "Have your father show you. He's better at getting the trap door open than I am anyway. Didn't he tell you about them when you talked about the whole Kryptonian thing?"
Clark's brow furrowed as he thought. "Yeah, he did. I'd forgotten. He said to tell him when I was ready but I forgot all about it. I'll ask him tomorrow. "
Martha gave Lois a hug. "Okay, well, come over for dinner some night this week, okay?"
They both nodded and she gave Clark a hug as well, before leaving.
"So do you want to call Pete and Abby or should I?" Lois asked, running the water in the sink.
"We don't have a phone yet," he pointed out.
"True. Why don't you go over to your folks' house and call them and see where they want to meet?"
He thought about asking her if she wanted to continue their discussion, but she was up to her elbows in suds and he figured the moment had passed. He sighed and headed out the door.
*****
Lois tossed her purse on the loveseat and headed for the bathroom. "Do you need in before I take a shower?" she asked Clark.
"No, go ahead." He grabbed the remote and sat on the couch, propping his feet up on the coffee table.
She went to her – their – room and got her things together. She took as long a shower as she could until the hot water started to run out.
She went through her nighttime routine and then went to their bedroom, putting her laundry in the sorter as she did. She was glad she'd put the egg crate on the bed earlier because she didn't have the energy to do it at that point.
She crawled into her side of the bed with the new body pillow her mom had recommended.
It wasn't long before sleep claimed her.
She woke to sunlight streaming in the window. She'd have to get Clark to put those blinds and curtains up before the day was out.
Clark.
Her brow furrowed. She didn't remember him coming in but... She rolled to see that his side of the bed was untouched.
Tears started to fill her eyes. He hadn't even slept in the same bed with her.
She closed her eyes and willed them to stay put, then got up, not bothering to close the door before she got dressed for the day. She heard footsteps as she finished putting her bra on but didn't bother to turn around or hurry putting her shirt on.
The footsteps stopped and she glanced up in the mirror as she reached for her shirt.
"Sorry," Clark muttered as he turned around.
She sighed. He was her husband. They'd spent a lot of time naked together that day. It wouldn't bother her in the slightest if she walked in on him without any clothes on. It might make her want to have her way with him, but it wouldn’t bother her.
Maybe she needed to buy some sexier pajamas.
She pulled the Lane Clinic shirt over her head, grateful that her parents had let her keep her job for them, for the time being at least. She changed into her pants, slipping her feet in her tennis shoes, stopping in the bathroom before she headed for the kitchen.
"Can you give me a ride to work this morning?" she asked Clark as she poured a cup of coffee. She was glad her mom had put a coffee maker with a timer on the list of things for her to get.
"I don't have to go in until ten, but yeah, I guess." Clark was just sitting on the couch, but she noticed a pillow and blanket in the corner behind the chair.
"Well, I have to be at work in forty-five minutes and since we only have one car between us..."
That was something else she was going to need to talk to her dad about. She had her regular savings, which didn't have a whole lot in it, and her car fund, which did. They'd promised that when she was ready to buy a car, they'd match her, dollar for dollar. She needed to find out if that still applied and start looking for a car. If it didn't, she still needed to look, but her options would be much more limited.
A car hadn't seemed to be a big deal before. Not when she lived across the street from school, four blocks from work – when she worked, and had Clark to drive her anywhere else because they went almost everywhere else together.
Clark sighed as he stood. "I'll go get ready then and we can leave in a few minutes."
"Thanks." Lois took a long sip of her coffee. It was the only caffeine she was allowing herself a day and she was determined to enjoy it.
It didn't Clark long to get ready and she was at work a bit early.
"Hey, Princess," her dad said as she walked in. "How was your first day at the new house? You guys get everything put up."
She walked around the counter and stuck her purse in one of the cabinets. "My husband slept on the couch but otherwise it was just peachy."
Sam's arms were around her in a second. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart. This has to be so hard for you. I can't imagine if your mom didn't remember me."
She rested her head on her dad's chest, enjoying being there with him. She'd missed him, even though it had only been twenty-four hours since she'd moved out.
"Thanks, Daddy," she said, moving away from him and carefully wiping her cheeks. "I needed that." She sat in the receptionist's chair. "I do have something I need to talk to you about, though."
"What's that?"
She took a deep breath. "A car. I mean, you always said you'd match the funds and I'd completely understand if you didn't anymore, given how the circumstances have changed in the last couple days, but I need a car and so I thought I'd ask because I can afford something nicer if it still applies than if it doesn't and I really need to start looking."
Sam nodded. "I'm glad you understand that the circumstances have changed and that could easily change that decision."
Lois nodded. They weren't going to. It didn't really surprise her but it would have been nice.
"We talked about it yesterday. Living so much further away... We'd planned on encouraging you to get a car after graduation and adding a bit more to the fund as your graduation present."
"But not anymore," she said quietly. "I understand."
"No." Sam shook his head. "No, we're still willing to. That was a commitment we made to you a long time ago. And we're still going to chip in a little bit extra to help with it. That doesn't mean you *need* to spend everything you have saved if you can find something good for cheaper. You're going to need that money before long. I'll be happy to provide your prenatal care for free if you want. I'll even do the delivery if you want me to, though I'd understand if you didn't, but you'll still have hospital costs and my cost for tests that we send out and you're going to need a car seat and a crib and clothes and diapers and everything else a baby needs."
Lois nodded. "Thank you. I'll start looking today and see what I can find. I won't spend everything just because I can," she promised. "And I'll let you know about the prenatal care and all that."
He glanced at the clock. "We have a few minutes. Do you want to do a quick ultrasound?"
Her eyes grew wide. "Can we?"
He nodded. "Sure. Come on."
They headed back to the room with the ultrasound machine. Lois knew this setup was different than big town doctors, but small towns were different. 'Dr. Sam' helped with everything from prenatal care to pronouncing deaths at the local nursing home. He and several other doctors from surrounding communities had finally broken ground on a twenty-five bed hospital in Smallville. They'd have medical personnel available twenty-four/seven at that point, reducing the work load for all of them a bit and making some surgeries available closer to home as well as an emergency room open all the time.
Even then, the closest labor and delivery facilities were in Independence, nearly twenty miles away. Close, but not always close enough. 'Dr. Sam' averaged four or five babies a year and had admitting privileges at Mercy Hospital. Though he rarely did the deliveries once a patient was there, he did provide prenatal care for a number of patients who would go on to deliver there.
Lois winced as the cold goop covered her lower abdomen. Her dad hesitated before placing the wand on her stomach.
"Do you want Clark to be here for this?"
Lois shook her head. "I'll show him the pictures. I don't know where he is, but I want to do this."
Sam nodded and pressed her stomach with the wand. After a minute, he pointed to the screen. "There you are, Princess. There's your baby." Another minute later, a thrub-thwub sound filled the room. "That's the heartbeat."
Lois watched the screen, mesmerized. "Wow," she whispered.
He frowned slightly as he took some measurements.
"What is it, Daddy?"
"Nothing."
"Dad-dy." Lois' voice held a warning tone that even Sam knew not to mess with.
He sighed. "Nothing big. The baby's just measuring a few days bigger than I would have expected given what you've told us."
"*Don't* even think it," she hissed. "We were *not* having sex before that day. And we haven't had it since, so I don't know why the baby's measuring a few days big, but don't even get it in your head that we were lying to you."
He nodded. "The usual explanation is that a woman forgot the exact date of her period or for some other reason misestimated when she ovulated or something, but I believe you." He handed her a washcloth to wipe her stomach off with. When she sat up, he handed her the slips of paper. "There you go, Princess."
"Thanks, Dad." Lois gave him a big hug. "You know the town's already talking, right? Apparently, Wayne Irig heard that I'd moved out to the Kent farm at the feed store yesterday."
"Which means the town is already wondering if you got pregnant before or after the secret wedding."
"Exactly."
*****
Clark waited outside the Lane Clinic for Lois to come out. She'd been right. He'd had a number of questions at Maisie's about the two of them and whether Lois had a 'bun in the oven', as several of the older ladies had put it, smiling slyly the whole time. He'd done his best to remain noncommittal, instead focusing on the wedding two months earlier before he lost his memory and how Lois had been hoping he'd remember on his own but when he hadn't by graduation, she'd told them the whole story.
Official confirmation of the pregnancy would have to wait.
Lois climbed into the truck and laid her head back on the seat.
"You okay?" he asked as he pulled out of the parking lot.
"Long day," she said. "Spent half my time fending off questions and the other half hiding."
"Maisie's was about the same. I tried to avoid the pregnant questions, though."
"Me, too. But then Jenny saw the ultrasound pictures in my purse and it's all over the office. They all said they wouldn't say anything but..."
Had he heard her right? Had she had an ultrasound without him? He tried to keep his voice light. "Ultrasound?"
"Daddy did one this morning before we opened. He said everything looks good except the baby is a few days bigger than he expected. He had the gall to think – even for a minute – that we'd been lying about when we started having sex."
"Did we?" Clark asked her quietly.
"No!" she answered sharply. "We got married the day before you flew into space and nearly died. We had sex after we got married – more than once – and didn't before that day and haven't since."
"So why is the baby bigger than expected?"
"How the hell should I know?" she snapped.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"Liar."
She sighed and changed the subject. "I need a car. Daddy said they'd still match whatever I spend out of my car savings, plus a little bit more that was my graduation present. It needs to be something safe enough for the baby, because – let's face it – we're not going to want to put the baby in here if we can avoid it."
He nodded. "That makes sense."
"Abby said last night her parents are getting a new car soon – maybe they'd sell me their old one for a reasonable price. It's a ten-year-old Jeep Cherokee. Silver. It'd be good for a baby and her dad always takes really good care of their cars."
"Yeah."
"I'll call her from your parents' house tonight and talk to her mom."
There was silence as they drove towards the farm. "Can I see the pictures?" Clark finally asked.
"When we get home," Lois said with a sigh. "Not while you're driving."
A few minutes later, they pulled into the farmyard. Lois hopped down and headed for his parents' house.
Clark sighed and followed.
"Martha? Jonathan?" Lois called as she knocked and headed inside, just as she always did.
"In here, sweetie," Martha called from the kitchen.
Clark continued to follow her until they were seated at the kitchen table. Lois was on the phone with Abby's mom, making arrangements to go over later in the evening to look at the Jeep.
"Oh!" Lois opened her purse once she hung up. "Daddy did an ultrasound this morning. Here's the pictures. They're not great – the baby's like half the size of a peanut, but there we go. Clark had already left, so he hasn't seen them yet either," she explained as she handed them to him.
He looked at one closely before passing it on and then stared at the second for a long time. His mom and Lois had moved on to other topics of conversation.
"Do you think it's because of me?" he asked suddenly.
"What?" they all asked in unison.
"That the baby's a few days too big. Is it because of me and, well, me? I mean, maybe Kryptonian pregnancies go faster or something."
"It's possible," Jonathan said slowly.
"Daddy offered to do my prenatal care for free – except expenses on tests and stuff he has to send out," Lois told them. "He even offered to deliver without a fee, though he'd understand if I didn't want him to. Given your... differences, maybe that's the best plan. It's not like he'd say anything if things got weird and we had to explain why."
Martha and Jonathan exchanged a long look before finally nodding.
"That's true," Jonathan said. "He'd have incentive not to."
"Unless he can't stand the idea that an alien is married to his daughter," Clark said suddenly. "And he wanted to get her away from me or something." He stood and started to walk towards the back door.
Lois stood after him. "Do you *really* think *so* little of my father? He loves you like the son he never had – he always has – just like your parents have always loved me like the daughter they never had. Do you *really* think he'd jeopardize me or his grandchild?" she practically yelled at him.
"How the hell should I know?" he yelled back. "I don't know the man. I don't know you. I don't know *any* of you." He swept his arm around the room in a grand gesture – including all of them, and the outside world, in his statement.
"Nothing's coming back?" Martha asked quietly, trying to ramp down the tension suddenly in the room.
"No," Clark said, frustrated. He ran a hand through his hair. "I don't remember anything and I'm out of ideas."
"I had an idea last night," Lois muttered.
"What?" he asked.
"You heard me, Mr. Kryptonian."
"What was your idea?" Jonathan asked.
"I suggested that maybe making love to his wife would help," she said sarcastically. "But, no. He slept on the couch instead."
"Do we have to do this here?" Clark said. "If you want to fight, we can, but we don't have to do it in front of my parents."
"Why not? You won't talk to me anywhere else. You won't touch me. Two nights ago is the first time you've really kissed me in *months* and it was obvious you didn't even want to do that."
Clark glared at her. "You've been weird and withdrawn for weeks and I'm supposed to suddenly realize that I'm madly in love with you?"
"I thought I might be pregnant. That a guy who didn't even remember marrying me had gotten me pregnant. Of course I was weird and withdrawn. It was *so* reassuring to know that our one day together was so memorable he didn't even feel anything for me once he lost his memory." Her voice was getting louder again, just as his had. "But I can't *say* that. I can't say how much I hate this. How much I miss *my* Clark. How much I wish your memory of us was back. It's selfish and all that, but, right now, I don't care if you *ever* remember anyone else. *Ever*. I just want you to remember *me*. Remember *us*. And I know it's not your fault and you saved the whole damn world when you lost your memory, but that doesn't mean I like it." She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. "I offered what I thought was a *valid* suggestion – making love to your wife, recreating what – at the time – should have been, and actually was, an incredibly beautiful moment in your life. You didn't want to even contemplate it because you don't remember me, you don't love me and I get that, but that doesn't mean I *like* it." She headed for the door. "If you want to *sleep* with me tonight, you're welcome to, otherwise find somewhere else to be. Maybe the hayloft will jog your memory."
The screen door slammed behind her as she left.
Clark sank into one of the chairs before looking at his parents. "What do I do?" he whispered. "What do I do?"
*****
TBC
