Thanks to Carol for all her help!
From Chapter 28
I sighed. “It doesn't matter. Maybe my mom is right. Maybe I don't love Maddie as much as I think I do. I just can't do what I need to do to make this right,” I said, feeling frustrated.
“I don't get it,” Lois said, but then rushed on. “You know if you told me what was wrong, maybe I could help.”
“Maybe,” I said, not that I had any intention of telling Lois what was going on. “I think it's just over, though, Lois. Maddie deserves better anyway.”
Lois snorted. “Where is she going to find that?” she asked me.
“What?”
“Better than you,” Lois replied deadpan. I gave her an incredulous look and she clarified, “You are always telling me that if Paul doesn't notice me, that's his fault. Well, the same is true here. Maddie isn't going to do better than you, Clark.”
I gave her a shallow smile. “You'd be surprised how easy that would be,” I told her knowing that any doofus on campus would be better than me. Well, maybe not any doofus, but most. I mean, how hard could it be to be better than the weirdo who could fly?
Chapter 29
I walked back to my room feeling at least a little bit better. Somehow it was a little easier to take the whole break up with Maddie when Lois wasn't also angry at me. Not that her anger at me earlier hadn't been justified.
Still, I had to admit that I was sort of looking forward to the semester ending in a couple of weeks. Things weren't the same now and even the journalism class, which was my favorite one this semester, had been sort of sleepy since the big assignment for midterms. Professor Matthews had told us that this would be the case – he tried to assign the biggest assignment early so we didn't have a big investigation to deal with while we were trying to study for finals. So, even when I asked Lois what I missed by skipping class that day before the break, she had shrugged, telling me I hadn't missed much.
I stopped when I realized where I was. My feet had taken me directly to Maddie's dorm. Somehow I doubted she'd be happy to see me this evening, so with a sigh, I did an about-face and went back towards my own. Maybe now would be a good time to take on more Boy in Black activities. I had nothing else to keep me occupied in the evenings.
When I got back to my room, however, I realized I had more school work to do. Star was right. I couldn't keep putting off choosing my classes for next semester. So with no real interest, but a feeling of obligation, I pulled my course catalog towards me and started flipping through it.
There were a few classes I had to take – the next class for the journalism degree was specifically on investigative journalism. It wasn't mandatory you take it next semester, but it was a bad idea to wait if you were going to apply for a Planet internship since that was the class with the second recommendation. While I felt fairly confident that I'd get a recommendation (much more than that I'd get the internship), it seemed like a stupid idea to put that at risk by not taking the next class.
It was also recommended however, that you limit your journalism classes to just one and heavy up on some of the other requirements for graduation. From talking to some upper classman, some of the more advanced journalism classes took a lot more of your time and left little free time to focus on areas where you may be weak, so it made sense to get other requirements out of the way now.
The remaining classes to take were somewhat open, though. Essentially, aside from needing one-hundred and twenty credits to graduate, I needed to take a mix of classes from different disciplines. My poli sci course this semester had fulfilled the need for a class on government or economics and the math class for non-majors I was taking with Lois and Maddie fulfilled the math requirement.
I still had a science requirement I needed to fill as well as a literature one. I sighed. Actually, there were several other requirements – not that this was surprising given I had only finished my first semester. I really only needed to take two courses a semester towards these inter-disciplinary requirements in order to meet the goal. This left me a fair amount of time for both journalism classes – I'd likely take two a semester starting next year – and then at least one other class of my choosing.
Maybe literature would be a good class for next semester. I looked through the catalog, but there were a dizzying array of classes – early American literature, late American literature, early British literature, late British literature. There was even a class on classic Greek literature taught in Greek. I wasn't sure I was fluent enough in any language to take a literature course in it, so I should probably stick with the American and British classes. Unfortunately, none of them seemed as interesting as I would have liked. I wasn't interested in a semester of Jane Austen and while I loved the novels given as examples for the early American literature class, I had already read many of them. So maybe this was a class better left for later semesters given that it may not be that difficult for me.
I flipped to a new section, deciding to come back to literature later. So far, I had been flipping through the catalog for an hour and the only course I had decided on was the journalism class. Somehow, when Star told me I was going to have trouble deciding on a course, I had thought she meant one course, not all of them.
I went back to the front to look at the other inter-disciplinary requirements and pick one I thought I might want to fill next semester. Both social science and history seemed like good options for next semester, so I went to the social science section. Sociology did not interest me at all, so I flipped past all of those. Philosophy? Maybe. That didn't seem so bad. I marked that down on my notebook with the class times to come back to.
Okay, so two classes down. But to get to my one-hundred and twenty credits, I needed to take fifteen a semester and so far, I was at six. This wasn't even enough to be a full time student. I sighed. My heart clearly wasn't in it tonight.
I tossed the catalog aside, but then quickly grabbed it back. It seemed unlikely I was going to get out of this funk I was in sometime soon and I really did need to decide on classes.
“Hey,” Steve called, startling me as he opened the door.
“Hey,” I replied listlessly.
“What are you up to?” he asked, pulling his shirt on over his head and reaching over to grab his deodorant. It was readily apparent what he was up to.
“Just picking out classes for next semester,” I told him.
“Ah, man, our choices don't need to be in until Friday. Come out with me tonight,” Steve said.
“What?” I asked, confused. I thought Steve and I had established pretty early on that we were very different people. Aside from lunch a few days a week, we weren't really friends and almost never saw each other outside of the dorm.
“You and Maddie are history, right?” he asked me. As always, he managed to convey just the right tone of nonchalance to make it seem like nothing in the world could possibly be painful – including the demise of a relationship with someone you were in love with.
“Yeah,” I said warily. I wasn't sure what I was agreeing to.
“So, come out with me. The Sigma Phi House is having a party,” Steve said.
I almost said no – I hadn't really had that much fun at the last frat party I had been to – well, except for talking with Maddie afterwards. Before I could, though, Steve added, “Josh is coming, too.”
“He is?” I asked. Josh hadn't had any more fun at the last party than I had. Steve was really the only party guy in our group.
“Yeah, they have a killer game room,” Steve explained.
I shrugged. Maybe it would be quieter in there than the rest of the party? If not, I could always bail anyway, I guessed. “Sure,” I said, tossing my course catalog to the side.
Steve smiled at me as I grabbed my jacket. I just hoped this didn't make him think he was going to convert me to a party boy.
************************
“Hey,” Josh said when I followed Steve's half-hearted advice on how to get to the game room. Without the help of my enhanced vision, I wouldn't have found it.
“Where is everyone?” I asked him, looking around.
He shrugged. “These rooms are always half empty during parties. It's the best part- you can't come in to use these without a friend in the frat normally, but only a few of the frat guys want to be in here when there are girls upstairs. I'm actually glad you're here. Otherwise I need to wait until later for one of them to come down here so I have someone to play with.”
He motioned towards a bumper pool table. “Want to play?”
I smiled. This was going to turn out to be my kind of party after all.
************************
I was tempted to pack using super-speed, but Steve was still around here somewhere and I wasn't really up for explaining to him how I managed to pack in less than a minute. Particularly as I had to admit, since Maddie had stopped dropping by, I had let my side of the room go to pot. Not that it mattered that much – Steve had never been much of a neat freak, so now our sides matched.
Still, it meant I had some cleaning to do. We didn't need to take everything home over the long break, but it made sense to clean the room before leaving for a month. Besides, there really was a fair amount of packing to be done. Given the limited space, most of us only brought enough clothes for the first semester. Some of my winter clothes could stay since I'd be back in February, but I needed to go through the “fall” clothes and decide which I was likely to use in the spring. I had to admit, I was glad I was a guy. My guess was that this was a much harder task for girls.
The knock at the door startled me as we had had the door open all day. It was a bit party like here with the semester over and everyone packing. Lois, however, seemed oblivious to the chaos around her, though, when I saw her standing just outside my door.
“What's up?” I asked, raising my voice loudly to be heard over the din in the hallway.
“I just had the best day,” she told me with a broad smile. I wasn't sure I had ever seen her looking so happy and I realized with some surprise that I had also never seen her looking so beautiful. She was nearly glowing.
“Care to share?” I asked her.
She blushed a bit as if she wasn't sure she wanted to, but by now I knew Lois enough to know to just wait. She had knocked on my door – clearly she did want to share. She still, though, seemed to be trying to determine the best way to be friends.
Finally, she seemed to make up her mind and walked fully inside, closing the door behind her. “Do you mind?” she asked me, motioning to the closed door.
I shrugged. “I don't, but if you want privacy, this is not the best place to get it today. We could go out.”
Lois' eyes lit up. “I could go for another brownie at Anjelina's before I head home.”
I laughed at her. “Lois, you live in town. You can come by Anjelina's anytime.”
She shook her head, “I know, but I'm never in this neighborhood.”
“Well, then, Anjelina's it is,” I said as I guided her out the door. “Some day you're going to have to take me to see your house so I have an idea of what other parts of Metropolis look like. And why getting on the subway to come here is such a big deal.”
Lois scrunched up her nose. “There's nothing to see. My parents live in a boring building. It's nice, I guess. We have a doorman and stuff, but it's just city living. Like an apartment, only they own it. Nothing like living on a farm.”
“What?” I asked, shocked. “Are you suggesting there are some benefits to Smallville over Metropolis?”
Lois laughed – actually her laugh was almost tinkle-like. I glanced at her again. Was she just really happy or was she high or something?
“Hardly,” she said, making me feel a little better. “But you know, no one around here is going to have a pond on their property.”
I opened the door for her as we reached Anjelina's. “Or a barn,” I added.
“Not a benefit,” Lois told me. “Barns smell.”
I raised an eyebrow at her. “When was the last time you were in a barn to see if it smelled?”
“I've read books,” Lois told me.
“Well, not on the Kent farm,” I replied. “Our barn does not smell.”
Lois smiled at me. “Okay. I'll have to trust you on that one.”
A few minutes later we were seated with a brownie in front of each of us. “Okay,” I said to her as I broke off a piece. “Spill. What's got you so happy?”
She leaned forward slightly and with a smile whispered, “I went out with Paul last night.”
“You did?” I asked, rather loudly actually, as I was surprised.
“I told you I would,” Lois said, leaning back and looking smug.
“What'd you have to give him to do it?” I asked her. “Another article?”
“That's not fair, Clark!” Lois said, looking sincerely hurt. “You don't think he'd go out with me otherwise?”
I sighed, knowing I had bungled things. “Honestly, no. But not because you're not pretty enough or smart enough or interesting enough or whatever else it is you're thinking. Just "cause Paul's a jerk and I don't think he dates girls unless he gets something from them.”
“What was he getting from Linda?” Lois asked me.
“I don't know,” I admitted. “But I have an idea, and I hope it's not what he got from you.”
Lois blushed and I worried – she wouldn't really do that, would she? Not Lois. She had way too much self respect for that. Although… not where Paul was concerned. She had let him steal her story. Why not her… well I didn't really know if he could have “stolen” her virginity. Although that was the wrong word. Taken maybe? I just sort of assumed that given that Lois said she had trouble making friends in high school, she probably didn't date much either.
“Lois,” I said softly. “Please tell me you didn't sleep with him just to get him to go out with you.”
“What if I wanted to?” she asked me.
“Did you?” I asked her.
She shrugged. “I don't know.”
“You didn't…” I started, but she cut me off.
“What if I did?” she asked me, and her flashing eyes let me know I had gone too far. “Is that so bad? I really like him, Clark. Maybe even love him. You're not going to tell me that you and Maddie didn't… I hate the double standard that makes you a success for sleeping with Maddie and me loose for sleeping with Paul!”
I closed my eyes, knowing I had to tread carefully if I didn't want her to storm out. “I'm not applying a double standard,” I told her. “You probably even remember that Maddie and I finished our first date by going to the movies with you. And even after that, we never…”
“You didn't?” Lois asked surprised.
“No,” I told her. “Which doesn't mean I think you're… easy? I don't know… if you did with Paul. Just that I hope you didn't do so just so he'd go out with you. You should be with a guy who wants to be with you just to spend time with you. The rest of it is just… bonus or something.”
Lois giggled. “Only the farm boy.”
“Thanks,” I said, rolling my eyes at her.
“So,” she said, blushing again. “I did sort of tell him that I'd sleep with him before the date. But I meant it, Clark. It didn't really seem like I was giving in or anything.”
“But?” I prodded her.
She smiled brightly at me. “I don't know,” she said. “The date went really well. We went to EOW and talked. And then we took a walk around campus. But when we got back to his room, I sort of freaked out. I was sort of regretting telling him I'd… well, you know. So we started kissing and stuff and at first it was nice, but then I got just more and more preoccupied with what was coming and just couldn't… Well, anyway, I ended up asking him if he'd mind if we waited.” She finally finished, taking a deep breath – perhaps the first since she'd started.
“And?” I asked her quietly, only hoping that her good mood meant he had responded well.
“And he was fine with it,” she said, smiling brightly. “He said he never meant to push me and if I wasn't ready, then I wasn't.”
“Really?” I asked, surprised, but somewhat impressed. Maybe Paul wasn't the jerk I thought he was.
“Really,” Lois said as she popped the last piece of brownie into her mouth. “So, he must really like me, right?”
“Yeah,” I smiled at her. “Not that that's surprising.”
She glared at me, although her eyes were still shining.
“Okay,” I admitted. “It's a little surprising. But only as I thought Paul was a jerk. Not because it's really surprising that he finds you attractive. So when are you seeing him again?”
“Not until next semester,” Lois said. “He lives in Florida somewhere, and is going home over break. But we exchanged addresses and he said he'll write to me.”
“That's great, Lois,” I said. I meant it, too. Or sort of. I just couldn't help feeling that this was the first time I had heard anything about Paul that didn't make my skin crawl, and so it was hard to be sure he was really not a jerk after all.
