Author’s Note: From now on all action takes place in canon dimension. The Clark is canon Clark. The Lois is canon Lois back from her year abroad in alt-dimension.
For a plot summary, please click here:
Synopsis of Chapters 1 - 7 Missing Lois - TOC ***
Part 10“Okay,” said Clark, turning to his wife. They were sitting in their living room on the couch. “That was the final one. What did you think of her?”
Lois stood up. “I hated her.”
“Lo-is.”
“Well, all right. I didn’t
hate her. I hated the idea of her… of any of them. Clark, we cannot have a live-in nanny, end of story. We just can’t.”
“Your mother is leaving on her cruise in less than a week, Lois. We need someone to watch Lara.” Clark wrapped his arms around his wife.
“Not a live-in, Clark,” Lois whispered. “I can’t. I need you…” She swallowed. “And you need one place where you are free to be yourself. And that one place should be your home.”
“We all make sacrifices for our children, Lois.”
She turned around and kissed him. “I have… I will stay home with her before I let you give up the one place you can be you.”
Clark smiled. “I love you, too.”
“What we need is someone who can watch her during the day, but doesn’t need a room and won’t be around on the weekends. Yet, someone we can trust.”
“Agreed. Someone we can trust, who has her own place, no room and board, who doesn’t work at night or on weekends. Sounds like a cushy gig to me. Someone will jump at the chance to watch Lara.”
“Ha-ha, Clark.” Lois sneered at him.
“We’ll have to pay extra if we don’t include room and board,” Clark informed her.
“I know. But I was thinking since we basically don’t eat out anymore.” She shrugged. “Oh, God! Jimmy and his girlfriend, Penny, will be here any minute.” She batted her eyelashes at him. “Can you run and get us a baguette?” Only when she said run she made the hand signal for fly.
Clark kissed her. “Need a bottle of wine, too?”
“If you can find one. Red, please.” His wife smiled, running into the kitchen. “Love you!”
Clark sighed and then flashed her a hopeful look. “Can I take Lara with me?”
“Don’t you dare!” Lois called back. “Just what we need is to have someone see Superman with a baby strapped to his chest.”
Clark picked up his daughter out of the playpen. “Sorry, sweetie. Mommy says no flying tonight. Maybe we can go see Grandma and Grandpa this weekend.” He smiled, kissing her head. He set her back down and then disappeared out the living room window.
Lois’s husband returned a moment before the doorbell rang, instantly spinning back into his everyday clothes. Lois came out of the kitchen wiping her hands on a towel. “Cutting it a bit close, aren’t you? Just what we need is Miss Ninety-Seven-Percent to see you fly in the window as they walk up the front stoop.”
Clark kissed her cheek, handing her the baguette and wine. “You’re welcome.”
His wife smiled her thank you as she opened the door for Jimmy and Penny. Lois quickly greeted them and then rushed back into the kitchen to throw the baguette into the oven.
“So, is this her?” said Penny, bending over the play-pen. “Hello, there. She’s adorable.” Jimmy’s girlfriend swatted at him. “Why didn’t you tell me how cute she is?”
Jimmy rolled his eyes at Clark. “Nothing personal, CK. But Penny, all babies look alike… like babies.”
Penny picked her up. “Don’t be ridiculous, Jimmy. Of course, they don’t.”
“Wow,” said Clark. “She usually hates it when strangers pick her up.”
“Oh. I’m good with kids. Three nieces. Two nephews. Six cousins. Plus, I’m not a stranger, am I, Lara? I’m Auntie Penny.”
Jimmy swallowed. “Beer, CK?”
“I’ll go find you one,” Clark said. In the kitchen, as he pulled a beer out of the fridge, he said, “Penny has lots of experience with kids.”
“No, Clark. She isn’t going to want to be a professional babysitter. Don’t even think about it.”
“I’m just saying…”
Lois gave him the sharp ‘shut up’ look.
“All right. Got it. I’m going.” He swung through the door to the dining room and handed Jimmy the beer. “Would you like a glass of wine, Penny?”
“I’ll wait until dinner. I allow myself two glasses per day only with meals.”
“Really?” answered Clark.
“I heard that,” he heard Lois whisper in the kitchen. “We didn’t invite them over to interview her for our nanny position, Clark. Stop it.”
Clark grinned at their guests. How did Lois always know what he was thinking?
Lois came out carrying a platter of crackers and cheeses. “Dinner’s almost ready.”
“Nice,” said Penny, helping herself.
“Well, Clark loves his French cheeses.” Lois chuckled.
“So, have you found yourself a job since Diticom?” asked Clark.
Lois shot him a glare as she watched Penny bounce Lara on her knee. Her daughter laughed.
“I’ve got a retail job selling clothing for now, but the hours are really all over the place and the pay is nil. Nights and weekends mostly. I was hoping to go back for my masters in computer science. I could take night courses at Met U. if I could find a day job. Something brainless, where I could get a few hours of studying in.” She shook her head. “Like that’s possible.”
“Computer science, huh?” Lois replied, looking at her daughter. Lara reached for her mother and Lois gladly picked her up, rocking her back and forth on her hip.
“Well, I kind of got interested in programming computers when I made my Superman database.” Jimmy’s girlfriend smiled weakly. “If I had had the proper skills…” She shrugged.
“Penny,” Jimmy warned.
“I might never have met Jimmy,” Penny said, reaching over and taking his hand.
“Are you still looking for Superman?” Lois asked, with a sharp glance at Clark.
“No. I’ve got all the super man I need, right here,” Penny replied, kissing Jimmy on the cheek.
“Also, it would be a big downer on our relationship,” Jimmy added under his breath.
“Of course. Jimmy’s a wonderful guy.” Lois smiled at her friend.
“He sure is,” agreed Clark.
Jimmy pulled on the neck of his shirt. “Whoa, guys, I’m suffocating here.”
They laughed.
“Clark, if you could take Lara…” Lois handed their daughter over to him. “I’ll go get dinner served.” She disappeared into the kitchen.
“She’s come a long way, CK. No more of those twitches she had the first week back,” Jimmy said, his voice lowered. “I was really thinking she was losing her mind there for a while.”
Clark smiled, but couldn’t help agreeing with Jimmy. Lois had calmed down since he got her back to work, able to focus her energy on a story. The glitches in her personality were still there and would pop up at the most unexpected times, reminding him that she still could have spent a year in the other dimension with the other Clark. It was one of the main reasons Clark was trying so hard to find them a good nanny. She couldn’t go back to being a stay-at-home Mom. The darkness that had surrounded her those first few weeks was but a weak shadow now. Lois wasn’t a solitary soul. She needed to be surrounded by people, interacting with people, especially people who could answer her when she let them have a word in edgewise.
Clark set Lara down in her high chair at the end of the table.
“Is she eating?” Jimmy asked.
“No, she won’t start solids until after six months,” Clark informed him. He handed Lara her preferred throw toys. Pick-up was still one of her favorite games. “She’s teething though. Chews on anything and everything.” He grinned at his daughter.
“She looks just like you,” said Penny.
“Thank you. But she’s adopted,” Clark replied, then corrected himself. “In the process of being adopted. Although with this blonde hair I don’t know why people keep saying that.” He tousled Lara’s hair.
Lois arrived with the lasagna.
“Here, let me help,” offered Clark, following Lois back into the kitchen.
“
He’s the sweetest,” he heard Penny say to Jimmy. “
He just dotes on Lara.”
“
He’s a changed fellow. Well, not really changed, CK’s always been like that. It’s strange that a baby could make the happiest guy on earth happier.”
Lois smiled up at Clark, hugging him. He had no idea from where she had gotten her super hearing – well, improved hearing – which is what he was sure she had, because she never could hear like that before. He had gotten used to it. He even used it to his advantage at times to whisper sweet nothings to her, under his breath, just to make her smile.
“
How long has he worked at the Planet?” Penny asked Jimmy. “
Did he start before or after you?”
“
No. After. His first big story was the Messenger explosion,” Jimmy said. “Perry partnered him with Lois. It was love at first sight.”
“
Wait. The Messenger explosion? Didn’t Superman show up right after that?”
Lois slapped Clark on the arm and gave him the ‘told you so’ look. She could be so paranoid.
Clark rolled his eyes and carried the bottle of wine back out to the table, uncorked. “Ready for that glass of wine now?” he asked Penny. She was staring at him – really staring at him. He smiled politely and Penny nodded. Right, about the wine. Clark poured her glass and then filled the others.
Lois joined them with the salad and baguette. “
Bon appetit, everyone.”
“So, Lois, how long have you and Clark been together?” Penny asked, taking a sip of her wine.
“Four years,” Lois answered, serving the lasagna.
“Partnered together, four years. We didn’t start dating until eighteen months later or so,” Clark corrected. Four years? Where had she come up with that answer?
“Right.” Lois nodded, but she seemed distracted, thinking.
Adding? “Three years.”
“Just over two years, honey.”
“That’s what I meant.” She smiled and then shook her head. “Married almost two years.”
Jimmy stared at her. Then he glanced at Clark with a raised brow. “I guess a year with CK really feels like two.” He laughed.
“Ha-ha, Jimmy. Very funny.” Clark chuckled, but still stared at Lois. She had added a year to their marriage without even realizing it.
Lois seemed lost in space for a moment, then her focus returned and she smiled at him. “I don’t know what I’d do without him.”
“Aw, thanks, honey.” Clark reached down, picked up the gavel rattle, and set it back on Lara’s tray table.
“Lois, what year is it?” Jimmy asked her.
“1997,” she replied, looking at him like he was nuts.
“OK. Just checking.” Jimmy looked at Clark, who shrugged.
“Who watches Lara during the day? Do you have her in daycare?” Penny asked.
“My mother has been watching her since I went back to work,” Lois replied. They were on safe ground now. No more dates.
“Your mother? Lois, you hate your mother.” Jimmy laughed.
“She’s mellowed since our wedding,” Lois said, defending Ellen and then she chuckled. “Anyway, it’s amazing what you can forgive when you need a babysitter.”
Clark took a deep breath and plunged ahead, knowing the rocky waters he was sure to encounter along the way. “But she’s leaving on a cruise next week. Gone for two weeks. We’re searching for a nanny or babysitter; something more permanent.”
“Not daycare?” Penny asked.
“No, Lois is a bit paranoid about daycare. We’ve had so many wackos who treat our reporting as a personal vendetta against them. We think it would be safer for Lara to be at home.” Bait on the hook.
Penny nodded. “Makes sense.”
“This is really good lasagna, Lois.”
“Thank you, Jimmy. I had a good teacher,” replied Lois, before she winced.
“Who?” Clark couldn’t stop himself from asking. Lois still refused to tell him where she learned to cook.
“Me.” Lois grinned sheepishly.
“Lois couldn’t boil water before she met Clark,” Jimmy teased.
“Don’t listen to him, Penny. I could make pasta salad. I just ate a lot more microwave food back then, because I didn’t have a life. Having a family changes one’s priorities. I’ve slowed down. I relax more. I don’t jump in front of runaway buses as often.”
“Thank God,” Clark murmured.
“For a while there, it seemed like Lois was getting rescued by Superman at least once a week,” said Jimmy.
“Sometimes once a day,” Clark muttered. Lois kicked him under the table.
“I don’t take as many risks as I used to,” Lois growled. “I have more to live for.” She smiled at Lara, caressing her cheek. Then she bent down and picked up the gavel rattle, setting it on the tray table.
“So, are you looking for a live-in nanny?” Penny asked.
Jimmy’s girlfriend was nibbling at the bait. Clark looked at Lois with a pleading look, but his wife was ignoring him.
“Heaven forbid!” laughed Lois. “We need our privacy. I, for one, would go crazy with a complete stranger here twenty-four, seven, because then Clark couldn’t…” She stopped herself, before adding how much he needed his privacy.
Jimmy looked at him with a raised brow and Clark suddenly found his lasagna extremely mesmerizing. He could just think what things might be running through his friend’s mind to end that cliff hanger. ‘
Walk around the house naked’ was the one he guessed Jimmy chose.
“No, we’re looking for someone just for while we’re at the office, on weekdays. Nights and weekends off,” Lois replied.
The women were either completely blind to Jimmy’s smirk or just ignoring it.
Thank God! thought Clark.
“Wait. Penny, didn’t you say that you were looking for a daytime job, so you could do evening classes at Met U.?” inquired Jimmy.
“Well, yes…” Penny hesitated.
Lois looked at Clark with a ‘see I told you she wouldn’t be interested’ glance. She turned to Penny. “We couldn’t possibly consider taking advantage of your friendship like that. We completely understand that you’re looking for an office job… At least
some of us do.”
Clark was on the receiving end of another glare. He smiled sweetly at Penny. They already knew her background. They had done a check on her for the Diticom article.
Penny was staring at him again. She looked at Lois and then she looked back at him. And then she covered her mouth. Crap. The fish had gotten away.
“I could do it,” Penny suddenly volunteered. Hooked! “I need a job during the day with nights and weekends off to study and be with Jimmy. I’m great with kids, especially one as mild mannered at Lara. And you could trust me.”
Lois raised a brow at Clark with a glare. He grinned. Success!
“Well, I don’t know, Penny.” Lois was hemming and hawing.
“At least, give me a test run. Go out this Friday night for dinner and a show. I’ll watch Lara. You’ll see. I can do this,” Penny was practically begging them to hire her. Clark felt he was the King of Subtlety.
“I don’t know, Penny.” Lois was still not sold. “Friday nights are bad for us.” Busy Superman night, true. They had never had a successful Friday date night, yet.
“Right. What was I thinking?” Penny shook her head. “Thursday. I hear the new revival of
My Fair Lady is terrific.”
“
My Fair Lady? I’ve already seen that. Remember, James, you took me when your date…” She snapped her fingers. “What’s her name? The fashion model…” Lois closed her eyes for a moment to think. “April! April Stephens canceled at the last minute? Who knew Arnold Schwarzenegger could sing?”
Jimmy stared at her and then turned his gaze to Clark. “Arnold Schwarzenegger?”
“Yeah, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michelle Kwan. The dancing was so beautiful. I had
Get Me to the Church on Time stuck in my head for our entire wedding day. Remember, Clark, you had…” Lois stopped and all the color drained from her face as they all stared at her. Her finger still pointed at her husband.
“Fashion model?” Penny asked, turning to her boyfriend, eyebrow raised.
Jimmy just shrugged, perplexed. “I’ve never had a date with a fashion model, especially not April Stephens!”
“Lois?” Clark inquired, softly. Where had that story come from? The other dimension. He wanted so desperately for that to be true. “Lois?”
His wife swallowed and then placed a big grin on her face. “Fooled you!” She laughed. “And you all bought it. What a riot!”
Jimmy and Penny laughed, but Clark just stared at her. Lois didn’t play practical jokes like that or at all. It had to be a memory, a very distinct memory. Damn. He wished he could say he was positive, but he couldn’t. Why wouldn’t she just tell him the truth?
“Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michelle Kwan.” Jimmy wiped a tear from his eye. “I should have known, Lois. But when you called me James… I thought you had fallen completely off the deep end.”
“Yeah.” Lois sighed, taking a sip of her wine. “The deep end. That’s me, all right.”
“Lois, may I see you in the kitchen?” Clark asked, wiping his mouth on his napkin and pushing back his chair.
“Of course.” Lois smiled innocently.
As they entered the kitchen, he swooped her up into his arms and kissed her deeply.
“Clark!” she gasped.
“The truth, Lois. Was that a memory?” he asked. He had to know. He was going crazy, not knowing.
Lois swallowed. “Kind of,” she whispered, looking away. “It was a dream.”
“A dream?” Like the dream about the bald still-living Lex Luthor she had told Perry? Had that also been a memory from her time in the other dimension?
“Yes.” Lois turned away from him and started wiping down the counter.
He set his hand over hers. “Go on.”
“I had a dream about going to see a revival of
My Fair Lady with Jimmy, who happened to be a really wealthy man, who owned the
Daily Planet.”
“Like the Jimmy in the other Clark’s dimension?” Clark clarified.
“Oh, yes, I guess that explains why it was so weird, so
Twilight Zone.” Lois nodded. “I couldn’t understand why you had a date with Mayson on our wedding day.” That was what she had stopped herself from saying out at the table.
Clark, you had… a date with Mayson. He got a chill. That letter… the fake suicide note from the other Lois had mentioned the other Clark’s ex-girlfriend, the still-living Mayson. Had she also been hurt in a car explosion which Henderson, the other dimension’s Henderson could have investigated?
“Clark. It was just a dream.”
“Was it, Lois?” Clark murmured, pulling her into his arms. “I love you so much, Lois. Why won’t you tell me the truth?”
“I can’t,” Lois whispered, holding on just as tightly to him. “I can’t.”
That was as close to a confession that his wife had spent the last year in the other dimension as Clark was liable ever to get. He kissed her cheek and held her close. What had happened that was so horrible that she couldn’t tell him about?
“
He just took her into the kitchen to kiss her. They are so in love.” Penny sighed. “
I don’t know why I didn’t notice it before.”
“
They’re kind of obvious about it, Penny. The whole world knows how in love CK and Lois are.”
“
I know. Right before everyone’s eyes. How could I have been so blind?”
Lois looked at Clark. Was she hearing what he was hearing? What was Penny talking about?
“
Have you ever seen Clark without his glasses on?” Penny casually asked Jimmy.
Lois pulled back, out of Clark’s arms, and turned toward the door to the dining room at the exact same moment he did.
“Crap!” she murmured. His sentiments exactly. Penny was still searching for her missing three percent.
***
“Still working on that profile, Lois?” Perry asked, stepping out of his office and putting on his jacket. “You should be home with your family.”
“I want a full background before my interview with Bruce Wayne tomorrow. Clark’s home watching Lara.” Lois shifted some papers around on her desk. “Good night.”
“I’ll leave you a little night music to help you make his music your own.” Perry grinned, turning on the boom box to Elvis.
“Perry, don’t!” Lois stammered, but Perry waved heading down in the elevator. “Great. Thanks, boss.” Sneering, she went to the boom box and turned off the CD. She turned the radio to an oldies station, playing Donna Summers,
She Works Hard for the Money.
Lois started organizing the papers on her desk. She began to sway to the music, its beat catching her. Soon, she was singing and dancing along to the music, the papers forgotten. As the song ended, she heard a solitary person applauding. She turned around to see Superman glide down from the tall windows above the newsroom from which he liked to make his grand entrances and exits.
“Hi.” Lois smiled, returning to her papers. “What are you doing here?”
“Your Dad volunteered to give us the night off. I thought I’d come see the most beautiful Mama in Metropolis, take her out to a late dinner.”
Lois glanced around, lowering her voice. “Clark. Someone is going to hear you.”
Superman stepped up right behind her.
“You shouldn’t do this, here. We’re out in public,” she continued.
“No one’s here, Lois,” he whispered in her ear.
“I’m here and I say, no. I was the one that got burned last time. No one baked me brownies.”
Superman laughed. “But you still ate them.”
“Ha-ha.”
The radio came back from station break and
Burning Love blasted through the boom box speakers.
“Perry!” Lois growled, under her breath. She started marching over to the stereo, when Superman took her hand and spun her back to him.
“When’s the last time we danced?” he murmured, touching his chest to hers.
As soon as their chests touched, Lois looked deep into Superman’s eyes. Passion seared through her. She could not control this urge. She wanted him. She
needed him. Superman. Lois grabbed his face and pressed her mouth against his, pushing him against a near-by desk and climbing on top of him. “Oh, Clark,” she moaned, softly. Yes. Yes. Yes! This felt so right.
Superman lifted her off him and stepped away. “Lois?” Even he knew that was too much. “I’ll be right back,” he whispered, disappearing through the windows.
Lois covered her mouth. Oh, God! What had she done? Which Clark had she been kissing? Did she even know? If someone saw…
“Hi, Lois.”
Lois quickly spun around and saw Jimmy standing outside the darkroom door.
*** The End of Chapter 8 ***
Continued in Chapter 9 – Don’t Be Cruel***
Get Me to the Church on Time written by Frederick Lowe and Alan Jay Lerner, perfromed by The Civic Theatre in Auckland.
My Fair Lady play by George Bernard Shaw, music and lyrics by Frederick Lowe and Alan Jay Lerner.
The Twilight Zone TV Series created by Rod Serling.
Burning Love – Performed by Elvis Presley, written by Dennis Linde.
She Works Hard for The Money performed by Donna Summer, written by Donna Summer and Michael Omartian.
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