Thanks to Carol for all her help!
From Chapter 36
Still, while it made me feel better, as always, to do something productive with my gifts/curses, it had meant I had missed lunch with my friends. I wondered if I should try to find them and join them in studying or just skip it and show up for dinner.
I went back to the dorm – regardless of which I did, I, too, needed to spend the afternoon studying. I grabbed my books and went to the study lounge down the hall – I'd catch my friends later. Perhaps by dinner time I would have thought of a good cover story.
“Clark? Where were you?” Lois asked nearly the instant I opened the door. I stopped and stared in silence. I guess I'd need that cover story sooner than I expected.
Chapter 37
“Um…” I started. “I didn't realize you guys would be here.” Well, that was honest, but stupid. Now it sounded like I was trying to avoid them.
“Were you trying to avoid us?” Lois asked. Typical that she would cut right to the chase. At least she didn't sound annoyed as much as curious.
“No,” I said, and I could feel myself sweating. I have to say, it always annoyed me that with all my special abilities, I still reacted like a normal human to embarrassing situations. If I had to be cursed with being a freak, couldn't I have the added benefit of not blushing or sweating when nervous or embarrassed? “Of course not,” I added, not sure I sounded at all honest. “I just wasn't sure where you'd be studying.”
“Where were you?” Josh asked me, but he, too, didn't sound suspicious. In fact, no one seemed to be at all upset that I had blown them off for lunch except for Maddie. And she didn't see so much upset as… well, I wasn't sure what, but I thought I saw disappointment in her eyes.
“I spent the morning doing more surveillance for my article and kind of got caught up in what I was doing,” I said, happy to think of something to say that was very nearly the truth.
“Did you get anything good?” Lois asked me.
I nodded. “I have pictures now of them rolling and smoking joints. I think with this evidence I could probably write the article. But I thought I'd try to show the pictures to Mr. Dwight first – that vice principal guy I met with before. See if he changes his tune.”
“Trying to go for a happy ending?” Alicia asked me. Her annoyance at me for dating Lois had seemed to have vanished sometime while we had dinner on Friday night.
I shrugged. “I guess. Although I wasn't so much thinking of the story as that maybe I could convince him to do something in school to correct the problem. It's just that if I'm going to do that, I thought I'd incorporate it into the article as well.”
“Farmboys,” Alicia said with a smile. “You think you can orchestrate happy endings. It's admirable, Clark, and sweet, but a little naïve.”
“Probably,” I admitted, “but I should try, right?”
Alicia nodded, smiling. “Yeah. I imagine one day that will make you a good reporter.”
“And it may even get you to win you an internship now,” Lois said, her voice a mixture of admiration and jealousy.
“Well, maybe it would if I didn't need to compete with you for it,” I said, partly to make her feel better, but partly as it was true.
For her part, Lois just shrugged. “I guess we'll see how well my article turns out. I don't think I'll get much of anything else done on it until I start work next weekend.”
“Yeah, but once you have access to the files, your article should be all but written, right?” Josh asked.
“I hope so,” Lois said.
Eager to change the subject far off our articles and thus where I'd been all afternoon, I looked over Maddie's shoulder. “That looks awesome,” I told her. The picture was an incredible likeness of Lois and captured not just the obvious features of her dark hair and eyes, but also somehow managed to convey something of Lois' personality as well. The eyes and mannerism of the person in Maddie's picture showed a young woman who was both overly confident and a bit scared of her own shadow – much the same way Lois' eyes did.
Maddie flushed. “Thanks. It's not done yet, but I'm close,” she said.
“I thought you said your talent was more for the noticing details in other's pictures than in your ability to draw?” Chris asked her from his place beside Alicia, after looking to see the picture of Lois himself.
“It is,” Maddie replied.
“That's hard to believe,” Steve said. “My mom would kill to be able to do portraits that good. She sticks to abstract art as she says she can never capture the essence of a person when she draws them.”
Maddie blushed, and I took the opportunity of everyone being distracted to get my books out and make myself comfortable.
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“Hey, Clark,” I head Maddie's voice from behind me as I made my way across campus.
“Hey,” I replied turning around.
She fell into step beside me a minute later. “Where you headed?” she asked me.
“To philosophy,” I told her. “You?”
“Comparative religion,” she replied.
We lapsed into silence for another minute before we reached the social science building where both our classes were held. I opened the door and let her walk in before me, and she turned around once she'd walked through.
“Clark?” she said, her voice a question.
“Yeah?”
“Um… don't take this the wrong way,” she said, her heart hammering away inside her chest, “…it's just… well, maybe you were working on your article and that's why you didn't meet up with us for lunch as planned this weekend. But… well… it's just that…” She fumbled with her words and I could feel myself flush as I realized where she was going with this. “It just felt familiar, that's all,” she finally said. “Just don't make the same mistake with Lois that you made with me, okay?”
I nodded, at a loss for words, as I watched her walk into her classroom.
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I could hear the radio playing somewhere on the floor above me and hoped that there would be no natural disasters tonight. I could use a night off. Maybe more than one. I kept thinking of Maddie's words. I had tried to cut down on my Boy in Black duties when we were dating, and I think I had been somewhat successful, but not enough. Was it worth trying again or was I fooling myself to think I could do it?
I wanted to. Not just for Lois, but for me. I wanted to be able to have a normal relationship and I couldn't if I kept ruining them by running off to help other people. I bit my tongue to keep from laughing out loud – Steve had stayed in tonight and was asleep. What would Lois think if she could hear my thoughts? I kind of thought that she'd be ashamed of me for not helping if I could. Still, that was only if she knew, and there was no chance of that. No way was I stupid enough to tell her – I certainly didn't want the Boy in Black to end up as Lois' article for the Planet internship, and while I thought Lois cared about me, I wasn't sure she cared about me enough to pass up an opportunity like that.
The question still remained, though – could I ease up on my Boy in Black duties for the sake of my relationship with Lois? And just how much did I need to ease up on them? If I had to give them up completely, could I? It seemed like if I could, I should just give up and propose to Lois now. I bit my lip again as I imagined the incredulous look on Lois' face if I did.
Okay, definitely not ready to propose. And also probably not ready to give up being the Boy in Black full time. Did I really need to? Probably not. As long as I kept better track of time when I was helping out so I didn't run off with unexplained absences all the time. At least this weekend, Lois had bought my excuse that I was working on my article, and I could use those type of excuses for a little while. I'd need to start working on the Planet application soon, and there were bound to be other assignments for Halkuff's class after that.
So, perhaps if I could just limit the time I spent on helping somewhat, and become a better liar, I could make this relationship with Lois work without cutting out my extracurricular activities completely.
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“Guess what?” Lois asked, her voice downright bubbly over the phone.
“What?” I asked, trying not to laugh at how gleeful she sounded.
“Michelle and Grace both agreed to testify in front of the ethics committee if there has to be a hearing,” she said.
“That's great!” I told her. “Paul doesn't stand a chance then.”
“Yeah,” Lois said, and I could hear the grin on her face. “He was a bit subdued in the meeting today.”
“Well, you did warn him,” I reminded her.
“I know. And I thought he'd be antagonistic today, but he pretty much ignored me and Grace and then Michelle, too, when he realized she was sitting next to us for a reason.”
“I'd love to see Paul's face when he gets an invitation to the disciplinary hearing,” I said, trying to imagine the look on his face.
“Yeah, too bad we couldn't manage to be there,” Lois said.
“Well, I need to get going. I have another appointment with Mr. Dwight,” I told her. “I'll see you at dinner?”
“Yeah,” Lois replied. “Good luck.”
“Thanks,” I chuckled. “I think I'm going to need it.”
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“So, what can I do for your, Mr. Kent?” Mr. Dwight asked. This time there was no pretense of being friendly.
“Thank you for meeting with me again, Mr. Dwight,” I said, offering him my hand. He took it, but there was no warmth in the gesture, and I had the feeling he was barely tolerating this meeting. “I did some more investigating of the drug problem here at Westside.”
Mr. Dwight rolled his eyes. “I believe last time we spoke I told you that there was no drug problem.”
“I know,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. He was getting upset, but I didn't want him throwing me out of his office before I showed him the pictures. “But I wanted to be sure. I saw some of your students purchasing marijuana last week…”
“You must be mistaken,” he cut me off to say.
I pulled the pictures out of my pocket. “I took these pictures…” I said, offering him the pictures I had taken last week. “I know it isn't one hundred percent clear what they are purchasing, but I took these pictures just a couple of days ago. I think we can agree that there isn't much of anything else that they could be rolling into cigarettes and then smoking.”
For a moment, Mr. Dwight looked at the pictures in stunned silence, his face getting redder and redder. Then taking a deep breath, he began to speak in controlled tones, although I could hear his heart beating away in his chest. “I don't know what you are trying to pull here, Mr. Kent, but there is no drug problem here at Westside. These pictures weren't even taken on school grounds.”
“But the students are Westside students,” I pointed out.
“We are not responsible for them once they step off the grounds,” he replied.
I wanted to point out that they didn't stop being white kids from middle class families when they left here, but decided to hold in the temptation to be a smart-aleck. “I'm not suggesting that you are,” I said instead. “My question remains what sort of programs do you have in place to teach these kids about the dangers of drug use?”
Mr. Dwight took another deep breath. “And as I told you last time we spoke, we don't have any programs as we don't have a problem.”
“But these students…” I started pointing to the pictures.
“I'm a very busy man, Mr. Kent. You have now taken up my time on two separate occasions for a silly class assignment. I'll thank you not to do it again,” he said, standing up to signify the end of the conversation.
“Thank you for your time,” I mumbled as I left. One outside, I shook my head. I wondered in how many other ways Westside Elementary was failing its students.
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“You're being a bit idealistic, Clark,” Mom said to me over the phone.
“To expect the school to do some education on drug use?” I asked.
“Well, not that, son,” Dad added. “But it's asking a lot of this vice principal to admit that there's a problem.”
“And he's not wrong to say he isn't responsible for the students after hours,” Mom pointed out.
“No, but they could…”
“Really, it's the parents that are to blame here,” Dad said. “They should be teaching their kids, and should not allow them to roam unchecked in the city after school.”
“Well, Jonathan, that's a bit harsh, too. I bet some of these parents have jobs that they need, so they have limited control over where their children go after school,” Mom said.
“So, what?” I asked them. “These kids are just lost causes because their parents don't dictate where they go after school for what ever reason and the school doesn't see fit to educate them on the dangers of drug use?”
“I know it's hard, Clark, but you can't expect this type of problem to get fixed just because you took some pictures. Mr. Dwight was turning a blind eye to it before; your pictures aren't going to change that,” Mom said.
“I guess,” I said, disgruntled. “I just feel like the system is failing them, and I wish I could do something.”
“The world and all its troubles are not your problem, Clark,” Dad pointed out, not for the first time.
“I know,” I told him. “That doesn't mean I can't try to find a way to do something.”
“Like what?” Mom asked.
“I don't know yet,” I said. “But I'd like to find something. I'd hate to trash Westside in my article. If I could find a way to get Mr. Dwight to understand, to do something…”
“It doesn't sound like that's going to happen,” Mom pointed out.
“I know,” I said, half lost in thought. “What if I could set something up?” I said.
“Like what?” Dad asked.
“I don't know. But what if I offered to help them organize some sort of workshop?”
“I don't know if he'd agree, Clark,” Mom said, “and even if he did, Clark, you need to realize that one workshop isn't likely to change the behavior of these kids.”
“I know,” I repeated, feeling discouraged.
“Maybe your article will change things,” Mom suggested.
“How?” I asked. “It's just a school assignment.”
“Like the med school one,” Dad pointed out.
I chuckled. “Dad, you can't seriously expect this one to end up in the Planet, too.”
“Why not?” Dad asked. “It's just as good a topic.”
“Dad!”
“I'm just saying, Clark, you shouldn't discount the possibility.”
“Okay,” I said, just to humor him. Just then, Lois knocked on my door. “I have to go,” I told my parents.
“Okay. Tell us what happens,” Dad said.
“I will,” I told him as I opened the door. “Talk to you later.”
“Hey,” Lois smiled.
“Hey,” I smiled back. We stood there for a moment, smiling goofily at each other. “So, dinner?”
“Sure,” Lois smiled at me. I leaned down and kissed her before we headed out to the cafeteria.
