Back to the every Friday schedule (at least until I start writing with more regularity...)
As always, huge thanks to Carol!
From Chapter 30
Lois gave a small giggle. “I wish I had. I just sort of sat there for a minute before saying that I wasn’t planning to give him either and if that meant he didn’t want to date me than he wasn’t the person I thought he was.”
“Good for you!” I said, happy that at last she had not just let Paul walk all over her.
“I guess,” Lois said, shrugging again. “He called me a frigid cow and walked away.”
“Do you care?” I asked her. “You meant it, didn’t you? You don’t want to date someone like that.”
“I don’t,” Lois said, “but I can’t just stop my feelings for him. I keep thinking he’s… nicer than that or something. I know now he’s not, but… I just wish…”
“That he was more like you thought he was?” I asked.
“Maybe,” she said, leaning her head on my shoulder. “I was thinking more that I just wished he was more like you.”
Chapter 31
“No, I have an art class at that time,” Maddie said. We had so far discovered that the only days we all had lunch free at the same time was Mondays and Fridays, although everyone but Maddie and Steve were free on Wednesdays as well. Maddie had some sort of three-hour art seminar Wednesday afternoons and Steve had decided to join the intramural basketball team which had a game every Wednesday afternoon.
Today’s lunch was filled with comparisons of class schedules. Alicia had hands-down the worst – she had classes starting at eight every day, and it was agreed that Lois and I had the best as both of us had somehow managed to secure Friday afternoons off.
Surprisingly, except for Lois and me being in Professor Halkuff’s class together, none of us had any classes together.
“How come you’re not in this Halkuff’s class as well?” Steve asked Josh as he picked up his milk container and guzzled what was left.
“I decided to skip the journalism major,” Josh told him. Both Lois and I had talked to Josh about it over the break. He seemed somewhat torn as he loved to write, but just wasn’t sure journalism was for him. “That’s what the short story workshop is about,” he added. The English department here offered a few workshop style classes a semester and Josh had managed to get into one of them. It was quite an honor – apparently you needed to submit a portfolio of your writing to be considered, and then the professor chose eight students to attend the workshop. Josh was the only freshman to get in this year.
“It sounds like fun,” Lois said. “I wish I had gotten in.”
“You tried, too?” Alicia asked.
Lois shrugged. “Come on. Everyone who wants to be a writer of some sort dreams about writing the great American novel. I figured learning how to improve my short story writing would have helped with that.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t get in,” I said, still amazed at the transformation. Gone was the whimpering girl from yesterday. No one at the table but me had any idea what had happened with Paul.
Lois shrugged. “She said I was a strong writer, but lacked the creativity she was looking for for this. She urged me to try again and I probably will. There’s a reason freshman usually don’t get in.”
“Well, that just makes it all the more impressive that you did, then,” Maddie said to Josh and Lois nodded in agreement.
Now it was Josh’s turn to shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe I got lucky.”
“Or maybe creative writing is your calling like journalism is mine,” Lois said and I marveled at her again. This new Lois was really somewhat amazing. It was like she had spent time over break determining the fine line between being too hard and too soft or something. All the aspects of Lois that had made us friends were still there, but now she wasn’t this beaten down little girl – she was stronger and more willing to be herself. I guess it was elements of the girl I had spent so much time fighting with earlier last semester. I couldn’t help but find the result both amazing and, if I were to be honest, more than a little attractive.
“I hope so,” Josh said. “My dad seems to think I should have picked out a major by now.”
Alicia laughed. “Wow. Your dad doesn’t know many college freshmen, does he?”
Josh smiled at her. “Just me.”
“So, is this Professor Halkuff supposed to be hard?” Alicia asked us.
I looked at Lois, wondering if she had any knowledge of this that I didn’t, but she shook her head. “No idea. Clark?”
“I haven’t heard anything either,” I told them.
“But this is the class the second recommendation comes from, right?” Maddie asked us.
“Yeah,” I said, as I finished my sandwich.
“So, it can’t be that easy,” Alicia said.
Josh gave a snort. “Like Lois and Clark don’t have the recommendations all sewn up already?”
“I don’t think we do,” Lois said. “I mean, I think Clark does and right now I’m in a good spot for the second one, but I don’t think it’s a sure bet.”
“I’m sure it’s not,” I said. “My guess is if my article isn’t good enough, Professor Halkuff could even convince Professor Matthews that I just got lucky and I wouldn’t get a recommendation.”
“Of course that doesn’t change the fact that Perry White has seen your writing all ready,” Lois pointed out.
“He’s seen yours, too,” I reminded her.
“All the more reason I need to show him I can do better,” Lois said as we all got up.
“You’re going to get it, Lois,” I said as we moved towards the line to drop off our tray. “I’m sure of it.”
Lois nodded. “I hope so. I just… well, I really hope so.”
************************
“Welcome to Investigative Journalism,” Professor Halkuff said from the front of the classroom. “For those of you who want to be an investigative journalist, this is where it all begins. And for those of you who want to work in any other area of journalism, you will find the skills you learn here are the ground work for almost anything else you do.”
The girl sitting next to me, a tall skinny girl with auburn hair, snorted. “I doubt that,” she said under her breath.
“You will need to investigate to write editorials or the gossip column, even the obituaries,” Professor Halkuff said and I saw the girl next to me straighten up when she said ‘gossip’. I smiled. She looked like a gossip columnist to me.
Obviously, Lois, who was on my other side agreed, as I saw her hide a smirk.
“Perhaps most motivating to many of you is that in this class you will write an article that, in combination with the article you wrote for Professor Matthews last semester, will determine the two students who will get recommendations for the Daily Planet internship. And since Perry White is mostly looking for a freshman with investigative skills, this class will teach you the ground work you will need for the application process.”
Someone in the first row raised their hand and Professor Halkuff nodded at him. “If we’re learning the basics here, how will we apply it in the middle of the semester?”
“Has he never heard about natural ability?” Lois asked me in a whisper.
“Mr. White is looking for someone with a ‘nose for news’ as he likes to say,” Professor Halkuff answered. “He believes he can determine the great writers early in your education and a full semester of investigative reporting isn’t necessary.”
“That’s not fair,” someone in the back said loudly.
“Maybe not,” Professor Halkuff said, looking like she had this particular conversation a lot. “But as the editor of the greatest paper in the world, he gets to make that call. And I’ll tell you, few students here who were awarded the freshman internship at the Planet haven’t gone on to become the best in their field. So, I’d have to say, my experience has shown me that Mr. White knows what he’s looking for.”
I felt myself tense slightly and saw Lois do the same. He’d probably already sized us up. What had he thought? I wondered – was all his talk last semester about expecting something even better for my application so I didn’t get lazy or was he telling me that he already saw my weaknesses and wasn’t sure I would be the best candidate for the internship?
“Because I’d like to enable those of you applying for the internship the opportunity to really focus on it, the article for this class will be due in three weeks. The rules are similar to what you did for Professor Matthews – a topic of interest to either the students of Met U or the population of Metropolis is acceptable. I will also accept topics of interest for other locales, but keep in mind that this is a class in investigative journalism. If there is no investigation involved, you will fail.”
“When are the topic papers due?” Lois asked.
“There are none,” Professor Halkuff told us. “You’re on your own here. Submit the article when it’s ready or by February 22nd at the latest. If the topic is not up to par, it will be reflected in your final grade.”
“No pressure there,” I whispered to Lois.
“So you won’t tell us what you think beforehand?” someone asked.
“Is he deaf?” the girl next to me asked.
“This is the real world. You will not get feedback from Mr. White on your application to the Planet. Think of this as a practice run.”
I sighed. I was worried that my idea wouldn’t be investigative enough and could really use the judgment beforehand, but understood her point. I needed to learn to judge the worthiness of paper topics on my own.
“So what do we do in this class after this paper?” someone asked.
“I assure you, you will not be bored,” Professor Halkuff said, sounding vaguely annoyed. “I will be using your Planet application article as an assignment for this class, so even those of you not planning to apply will have to write one more full article and you will conduct several smaller scale investigations throughout the semester.”
Lois beamed at me. “This should be fun.”
I rolled my eyes. Fun wasn’t the word I was thinking of. Scary. Intimidating. Something more like that. I suspected, regardless of the internship outcome, that by the end of this semester, I’d have an idea of whether or not I was someone who had a ‘nose for news’, and I had no idea what I would do if I didn’t. I didn’t have a back-up career. Unlike Lois and Josh, I wasn’t really all that interested in writing the great American novel.
Of course, I could always become the Boy in Black full time. But that seemed like a cop-out and a decision I was hesitant to make while Mom and Dad were alive as it would hurt them so much.
I smiled. Or I could become the best farmer in all of Kansas.
************************
Josh and I had dinner that night at the student union and I was coming back from there when I bumped into Lois. “Lois?” I asked her. She was virtually stomping across campus.
“What?” she snapped at me, but then looked immediately apologetic. “Sorry,” she said. “I’m having a bad night.”
“Something wrong with the investigation of the apartment complex?” I asked her.
She shook her head. “No. I haven’t even started on that yet.”
“So, what’s going on?”
“The first Titan staff meeting of the new semester,” she said.
“I take it it didn’t go well?” I asked her.
She rolled her eyes at me. “What was wrong with me?” she asked.
“What?”
“What was wrong with me? What did I find attractive about that snake?” she asked and I smiled.
“No idea,” I told her, “but I’m glad you see the error of your ways now.”
“He ignored me through most of the meeting,” she told me, “and when he didn’t, it was to make snide comments about me. Like I’m not worth his time! Who knows if the guy has any talent at all or if he’s just good at getting girls to write things for him.”
“Even if he does,” I told her, “it’s not nearly as much talent as you have in your pinky finger. If he had just a fraction of the talent you do, he wouldn’t want to steal other people’s stories.”
Lois smiled. “Maybe he’s just lazy.”
“Maybe,” I shrugged. “But if he’s looking to get a job in journalism out of here, wouldn’t he want a portfolio of his best writing? So if the best he can do is better than what he can steal, he’d want to have that written.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be held to too high a standard. That will just make it harder for him to find someone good enough to steal articles from in the real world,” Lois said.
“Either way, you’re way too good for him,” I told her, smiling. I still couldn’t get over this new Lois. The fire in her eyes when she was angry was transfixing.
“Let’s bring him down,” Lois said.
“What?” I asked, confused.
“Let’s bring him down. Let’s get him off the Titan. Expose him for who he really is. Stop letting him get away with it,” she said.
“What?” I said again, surprised. Isn’t this precisely what she hadn’t wanted to do last semester?
“It was your idea,” Lois pointed out. “I was just too stupid to realize you were right. So help me do it now. Let’s make sure he can’t get a job out of here where he keeps skidding by, stealing articles, and making a successful career out of it.”
“At least until he loses his looks,” I said to her with a smirk.
Lois’ eyes lit up. “We could put a hit on him. Ask someone to mess him up so that happens now.” We both laughed before Lois added, “Not really, but we can expose him for the fraud that he is.”
“We could start by going back to Professor Matthews,” I reminded her. “He’ll back you up.”
Lois flushed. “But I told him I would handle it. I don’t really want to tell him what happened.”
I shrugged. “Maybe you don’t have to. Just tell him that you wanted to handle it by yourself, but the problem was bigger than you thought. Tell him Paul asked you to write more articles for him. And that he told you someone else on staff was doing that as well. Would she back you up?”
“I don’t know,” Lois said. “Maybe. She looked sorry for me at the meeting tonight. But if she’s been letting Paul get away with it while he was also dating Linda…”
“You thought he had stopped dating Linda. Maybe Michelle did, too,” I pointed out.
“Is this just stupid?” Lois asked me as she opened the door to her room. “Is it too late and I should just leave it alone?”
“No!” I said, possibly a little too emphatically as I sat on her bed. “This is important, Lois. You’re right to want to stop it. Hey,” I said as the thought occurred to me. “This could be your investigative piece for class.”
Lois blushed. “I don’t really want to write about myself. If you wanted to… well, actually, do you have another idea? ‘Cause I’d prefer you didn’t write it either.”
I nodded, completely understanding. “I won’t write it, but Lois, no one is going to think you’re stupid.”
“You did,” she said quietly, staring at the small area of blanket between us. “When I first told you I was interested in Paul. You thought I was an idiot.”
I smiled slightly. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just thought… well, he was so clearly not good enough for you.”
“But even later – you thought I was letting him walk all over me,” she pointed out. I didn’t say anything, because she was right. “Maybe I was,” she added. “But I thought I should be making an effort to be softer.”
“And now?” I asked quietly.
She shrugged. “You told me once that I could be both – not so argumentative and still not let people walk all over me. Did you mean that? I don’t seem too… I don’t know. Overbearing now?”
“Not at all,” I told her, trying to let her see how much I liked the new version of Lois. “You seem… real now. Whole. And it’s okay to get angry at people once in awhile.”
“I really don’t seem… what was the word Mrs. Noris in high school used… confrontational? She said I was too confrontational and hard to be around.”
I groaned. “Lois, the woman had a job as a high school guidance counselor. Didn’t you guys make fun of her at your school? Besides, it’s okay to confront people sometimes. And I don’t find you at all hard to be around.”
Lois smiled at me, her whole face lighting up. “Thanks, Clark,” she whispered, just before she leaned over and kissed me.
